A Sudanese official announced on Sunday that his country has lodged the United Nations a protest against "immoral" behavior of some UN personnel in southern Sudan.

Al-Saddiq al-Magli, the director of the peace department in the Sudanese Foreign Ministry, told reporters that his government lodged the protest in a memorandum delivered to the UN on Saturday.

"The government expressed in the memorandum its extreme concern with regard to the inhumane crimes committed by a number of UN employees against minors in southern Sudan," the Sudanese official said.

He said that the government also protested in the memorandum over UN's deliberation on keeping it from information about the investigation on those crimes.

Although UN officials in New York and Vienna affirmed that the investigations began as early as this May, but no outcome has ever been released since then, said al-Magli.

He added that the government also called for immediate response concerning these accusations, saying that only investigations conducted under directives of the UN secretary general are not enough.

The London-based Daily Telegraph newspaper reported last week that UN personnel in southern Sudan were involved in sexual exploitation and abuse of more than 20 children.

UN Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Jane Holl Lute said Friday that the UN had done more than ever before in the last two years to try to combat sex abuse in its 16 peacekeeping missions. "But we're not satisfied with where we are," he confessed.

Source: Xinhua