by Fayez Zaki Hassan

    KHARTOUM, Dec. 3 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations and African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) is entering a new phase after UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has officially appointed Nigerian diplomat, Ibrahim Gambari, as the new chief of the peacekeeping mission in the restive western Sudanese region of Darfur.

    Gambari, who will officially assume his post in January 2010, will succeed former UNAMID head of mission Rodolphe Adada who resigned in August 2009.

    In its first reaction to the appointment of Gambari, Sudan's ruling National Congress Party (NCP) welcomed the step and expressed commitment to cooperate with the Nigerian diplomat to make his task a success.

    "We welcome this appointment, and we will provide him with all necessary support," Fathi Shaila, the NCP's spokesman, told Xinhua.

    "Gambari will find the same cooperation provided to his predecessor Adada if he committed to neutrality," he said.

    He added that they wanted the new UNAMID head to carry on the steps of Adada, noting that Darfur had witnessed remarkable stability during Adada's term of office.

    Shaila further reiterated the NCP's commitment to achieve peace and stability in Darfur, saying "regardless of appointment of a new UNAMID head, our strategy remains to achieve peace in Darfur and return the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) to their home areas."

    On Dec. 31, 2007, the UNAMID took over the peacekeeping tasks in Darfur from the former African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS).

    UNAMID was expected to deploy 26,000 troops, but after two years of its mandate's commencement, that number has not yet been completed due to lack of funding and logistical materials.

    In the meantime, Mohamed al-Tigani, an official at the Transitional Regional Authority for Darfur, told Xinhua that "the UNAMID's problem does not lie in who runs it, but in its institutions."

    "There is a defect in the UNAMID structure besides an inconsistency in the joint performance of the UN and the AU," he said.

    He added that the UNAMID had not yet left any positive effect on the ground and that it had even failed in implementing its mandate as a peacekeeping mission, or assisting in achieving a peaceful settlement for the dispute in the region.

    "According to the UN resolution establishing the UNAMID, the mission is basically concerned with the implementation of the Abuja Peace Agreement, and during the past two years, the UNAMID did not hold a single meeting to discuss implementation of the agreement," he said.

    Ban Ki-moon in his report to the UN Security Council on November said around 20,000 troops had been deployed in Darfur out of the mission's full strength of 26,000 soldiers.

    The UN chief accused the Sudanese government of hampering the work of the UN-AU hybrid force in Darfur and said the government authorities had repeatedly denied UNAMID patrols to many areas in the region, a matter which he described as "direct violation" of the force status agreement, signed between the Sudanese government and UNAMID.

    His statements prompted anger in Khartoum, where media organs quoted Sudanese permanent representative to the UN Abdul-Mahmoud Abdul-Halim as saying that "it is time for these troops to leave (Sudan)."

    However, Sudanese Foreign Minister Deng Alore was later reportedly denied that Khartoum was planning to expel the UNAMID troops, saying "we have not asked them to leave. What has been circulated by the media in this respect is untrue."