Envoy sees little Darfur hope now

The chance for peace has slipped away for now, he told the council "with much regret," and the focus must revert to restoring security. He scolded all parties in the conflict, including the Security Council and himself, for not doing more to halt the violence. More than 2 million people have been displaced, and most estimates of the death toll since 2003 exceed 200,000.

Eliasson and his partner in the Darfur peace process, former Tanzanian Foreign Minister Salim Ahmed Salim, said they would soon step back and leave it to another peacemaker, a yet-unnamed African mediator, to try a new strategy for calming one of the world's most complex conflicts. The new mediator will be based full time in the region, unlike Eliasson and Salim, who were criticized for dropping in periodically for intense bouts of talks. Both will stay on in advisory roles.

"For over five years, millions of people have suffered enormously," said Eliasson, a former president of the General Assembly and once Sweden's foreign minister. "This simply can't go on."

The deployment of U.N. and African Union troops to the region has lagged alarmingly because of Sudanese government obstructions, U.N. bureaucracy and lack of equipment from donor nations, said Eliasson, but the goal of having 16,000 peacekeepers on the ground by year's end now seems on track.

Peace talks have stalled because one of the most influential rebel leaders, Abdel Wahid, refuses to join in until fighting stops, he said.

The U.N. has been focusing on Darfur too narrowly, Eliasson concluded, and efforts to stabilize the region must also consider the tenuous power-sharing arrangement between Sudan's north and south, as well as how the conflict with neighboring Chad feeds violence in Darfur.

The Security Council should consider sanctions on any party that impedes peace -- rebel or government -- as well as incentives to spur action from all parties, Eliasson said. An arms embargo should be enforced and perhaps expanded, he said.