A Sudanese official at peace talks to end the crisis in Darfur has said the government delegation would sign a humanitarian protocol to ease supply of aid to the troubled region, even if the two rebels there refuse to cosign it.

"We are going to sign the humanitarian issue tomorrow even if it is one side that will sign it," Ibrahim Mohammed Ibrahim, spokesman for the delegation told Xinhua at the end of Thursday's talks in Abuja, capital of Nigeria.

The Sudanese government and the rebels, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) and the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM), have been accusing each other of foot-dragging and wasting time at the talks under the auspices of the African Union (AU).

On what effect the protocol would have if signed only unilaterally, Ibrahim said that such would put the rebels under pressure.

"That will put them under pressure. They can not go back from Abuja without signing anything," he said.

The Sudanese agriculture minister and the leader of the government delegation, Majzoub El-Khalifa, also confirmed his side's readiness to sign the humanitarian protocol.

"Even if they (rebels) do not agree, we are going to sign the protocol," he said.

"We are wasting too much time. The talks were supposed to last for 15 days, now we have spent one week and achieved nothing."

Spokesman for the JEM, Ahmed Tugod, however, expressed optimism that the gray areas stopping the signing of the humanitarian protocol would be ironed out.

"What we want is to save lives and to guarantee that safety tomorrow," he stated.

But SLM Chairman Abdolwahid Mohamed insisted that the humanitarian protocol should not be signed until the security arrangement was completed, claiming that the government was "not cooperating."

"We want good security arrangement so that the security protocol will be signed, but the government is wasting time," he claimed.

Source: Xinhua