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NGOs Group That Buys Freedom
ABC News Internet Ventures/ Associated Press
for Slaves in Sudan Loses UN Rights
October 26, 1999United Nations - A Swiss group that gained notoriety for buying the freedom of Sudanese slaves lost its accreditation Tuesday with a key U.N. body, a U.N. official announced. The U.N. Economic and Social Council voted 26-14, with 12 abstentions, to drop the consultative status of Christian Solidarity International, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhardt said. The United States opposed revoking the organization's accreditation.
The council, known by its initials ECOSOC, is the organ which coordinates the economic and social work performed by the United Nations. The council dropped the group's accreditation for violating U.N. rules of protocol. Organizations with consultative status have a formal relationship that allows them to participate in meetings, make statements, bring up issues and submit reports to all ECOSOC bodies, including the Commission on Human Rights.
Christian Solidarity has engaged in a controversial program of purchasing slaves captured as war booty during the civil war in southern Sudan. While the organization contends it is freeing slaves, some human rights groups contend that it is stimulating the capture of slaves by giving them a cash value.
The Council vote is the culmination of a dispute arising from a meeting last March of the U.N. Human Rights Commission. At the Geneva meeting, Christian Solidarity International sent the Sudan People's Liberation Army leader John Garang as its representative. The SPLA has been fighting the Muslim-dominated government in Khartoum for 16 years to gain autonomy for southern Sudan's Christians and animists.
U.N. rules dictate that representatives of voluntary organizations, such as Christian Solidarity International, must speak on behalf of that organization _ and not other causes. But Garang spoke in support of the SPLA and distributed his remarks on the rebel group's letterhead, diplomats said. Sudan responded to the breach in the rules by demanding that Christian Solidarity's accreditation be revoked.
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