The United Nations and African Union (AU) urged on Thursday Darfur rebel groups which have refused to accept the May 2006 peace deal with the government to united their positions.

Visiting AU Special Envoy for Darfur Salim Ahmed Salim and UN Special Envoy for Sudan Jan Eliasson stressed at a joint press conference that the Darfur rebel movements ought to unite their positions so that the peace negotiations could be resumed as soon as possible.

They also hoped that various suggestions put forward recently by Chad, Libya, Eritrea and Egypt would be mixed up in order to build up a common ground for the resumption of the Darfur peace talks.

They admitted that what had been achieved in the previous negotiations did not meet all the demands of the Darfurians, adding that "we are working to treat and remove the fears that have not been concerned about in the Abuja agreement".

Only one of the three main rebel groups in Darfur has signed the Abuja peace agreement with the Sudanese government while the other two groups claimed the agreement was unfair.

The Sudanese government has complained that the international society especially the western countries abstained from exerting enough pressures on the non-signatories of the peace agreement.

Salim asked the Sudanese government to take responsibility for disarming militias in Darfur.

"Unless this issue is tackled seriously and effectively, the prospects of peace in Darfur become more remote. It is the government's responsibility," he said.

The UN envoy Eliasson said that the key word at the present stage was "convergence".

"If we have convergence now and move the negotiation process in a convergent pattern, then we will be able to seriously prepare for negotiations," Eliasson added.

He said that "we are between hope and desperation practically. Hope that we will not miss this chance to go for the political solution but also great fear that we will have uncontrollable developments."

Source: Xinhua