Washington: US Secretary of State Colin Powell has said that the Sudanese Government had agreed to lift restrictions on humanitarian supplies to the strife-torn Darfur region.

In yesterday's (Jul 1, 2004) interview from Khartoum (Sudan), Powell said his talks with the Sudanese Government on the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region yielded an agreement to a list of actions that they will be taking in the very near future that will ease all restrictions on visas for humanitarian workers, will make sure there is no interruption of humanitarian supplies or relief convoys or vehicles for the monitors who are out there.

"They have also committed to get immediately involved in the political process again, because we really have to solve this conflict ultimately politically or else it will break out again, and they've agreed to pursue that more vigorously under the auspices of the African Union," Powell said.

Pressed on the US refusal to use the term "genocide" to describe the Darfur crisis, he said, "If all of the indicators lined up and said this meets what the treaty test of genocide is, I would have no reluctance to call it that."

But, he added, the fact that the US has not called it that "is not based on reluctance. This is not Rwanda 10 years ago. It is Sudan now".