The Sudanese government on Friday welcomed a decision by the Peace and Security Council of the African Union (AU) to extend the mandate of AU troops in Sudan's western region of Darfur for another six months until June 31 next year.

"The decision supports the government's firm position calling for a continuous stay of the African troops in Darfur rather than transferring their peacekeeping mission to an international force subordinate to the United Nations," Presidential Adviser Majzoub al-Khalifa told reporters.

He added that "this decision comes on the right path of completing the mission of the African Union until the Darfur Peace Agreement is comprehensively implemented with a free African will."

Reiterating Khartoum's refusal of deploying international peacekeepers in Darfur, al-Khalifa stressed AU ability of resolving the Darfur problem with the cooperation of the Sudanese government.

The Sudanese government "is always exerting efforts to realize the peace in all parts of the country," he added.

The AU Peace and Security Council concluded its summit meeting in the Nigerian capital Abuja on Thursday evening by approving a package of proposals put forward by the Sudanese delegation under President Omer al-Bashir, calling for an extension of the pan- African body's peacekeeping mandate in Darfur.

The UN Security Council passed a resolution on Aug. 31 calling for the deployment of more than 20,000 international peacekeepers to replace the 7,800 AU force in Darfur, which suffers the lack of funds, equipment and experience.

The Sudanese government has rejected the mission transfer, saying it was a violation of Sudan's sovereignty and an effort by the West to colonize the African oil producing country.

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan put forward recently a proposal of deploying a joint UN-AU peacekeeping force in Darfur, but the proposal has also been turned down by Khartoum as "another version "of the UN deployment plan.

However, Annan said on Nov. 16 that Sudan had agreed "in principle" to the deployment of a "hybrid" UN-AU peacekeeping force in Darfur.

The Thursday Abuja meeting reportedly agreed that the AU force commander would be jointly appointed by the head of the AU Commission and the UN secretary general.

Source: Xinhua