CAIRO (AP) — The Chinese special envoy on the Darfur issue, Liu Guijin, said that his country would seriously consider sending troops for a peacekeeping mission in the war-torn Sudanese region and insisted that Beijing was doing its best to help solve the conflict.
Liu lashed out Thursday at critics who have accused China of backing the Sudanese government because of Chinese oil interests there. The actress Mia Farrow and other activists have branded the 2008 Beijing Games as the "genocide Olympics," trying to force China into pressuring Sudanese leaders.
"To link the Chinese corporations' involvement in the oil sector with loss of life in Darfur is baseless," Liu said. "That link is really ridiculous. The Olympics are a nonpolitical event."
With the heavy investments China has made, it has come to be viewed as a power broker in Sudan, which exports two-thirds of its oil output to China. As one of the five permanent UN Security Council members with veto power, China has opposed harsh measures against Sudan over the Darfur violence.
Liu defended Chinese efforts to bring calm to Darfur. "Even the United States has to admit that we've played a positive role," he said. "We've tried our best."
He said that China was instrumental in a diplomatic breakthrough this month when the Sudanese government finally agreed to let a major force of UN and African Union peacekeepers deploy in Darfur.
Sudan has accepted this hybrid operation "without any reservation," Liu said, adding that Beijing had advised the Sudanese regime to "be more flexible" regarding the force.
The joint mission will deploy in the coming months, aiming to end the fighting that has killed more than 200,000 people and made 2.5 million refugees in Darfur since 2003, when ethnic African rebels took up arms against the Arab-dominated Sudanese government.
China has not received a formal request to send soldiers for the 19,000-strong peacekeeping mission but is "open and sincere to making its contribution," Liu said.
"We will study the request, carefully and seriously," he said, adding that it was "a strong sign" that China had already committed 275 military engineers to the current UN force in Darfur.
Liu said that India and Malaysia had also invested in Sudan's oil industry and that a French firm had a drilling concession, without any of these countries being criticized. "Maybe some forces are not happy with China's presence" in Sudan, Liu said.
China also is a major weapons supplier to Sudan. Beijing has said that the sales do not breach the UN embargo on weapons entering Darfur, but human rights activists say there is nothing to prevent the Sudanese Army from taking the gear into the region.
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