"U.N. Searches for Missing Aid Workers"

[GreenPartyVoter]

AL-FASHER, Sudan (AP) - U.N. workers searched by land and air Tuesday for eight Sudanese aid workers missing in rebel-controlled territory in the western Darfur region, officials said Tuesday.

The search operations came as the U.N. Security Council was reviewing reports from U.N. teams in the field to decide whether to impose sanctions on the Sudanese government, under intense international pressure to curb rebel attacks, step up security and improve access to humanitarian aid in ravaged western Sudan. The government blames rebels for the unrest.

But Minni Minnawi, secretary-general of the rebel Sudan Liberation Army, denied that the rebels were holding the aid workers.

"We ourselves suspect the government, and the Janjaweed. The area in which they were kidnapped is not in our control. It is in the control of the government and there are many Janjaweed in that area," he told The Associated Press in Abuja, Nigeria, where rebels and government officials were participating in peace talks.

http://apnews1.iwon.com/article/20040831/D84QB8U00.html