SUDAN PLEDGES $300m TO AID DARFUR !

Sudan's government has promised $300m (£150m) to "help rebuild and repair" Darfur, tripling a previous pledge, said ex-US President Jimmy Carter.
Mr Carter said President Omar al-Bashir was also willing to have international observers at planned elections in 2009.
Jimmy Carter is part of a group of four elder statesmen who are in Sudan to try to find solutions to the conflict.
Meanwhile, Nigeria has said pledges of troops and equipment to a joint AU-UN peacekeeping force must be honoured.
A presidential spokesman said Nigeria would continue to support the African Union's mission in Darfur, despite the weekend attack in which 10 troops were killed by rebels.
But the creation of a new, combined operation with the UN, he said, must depend on other African countries playing their part.
Urgent talks are going on about how to strengthen the force.
Jimmy Carter told the BBC that talks with Sudan's President Bashir were "constructive".

Africa's toughest job?

He said $100m of the promised compensation money would come from Sudan's government and $200m would be a loan from China.
Mr Carter said the payout would "help rebuild and repair the damage that has been done" in Darfur and that it was "a clear indication of [President Bashir's] commitment".
Sudan promised to pay $30m in compensation to Darfur under the terms of a 2006 peace agreement signed with just one rebel group.
Other rebel groups rejected the offer, saying it was too low and remained dissatisfied when it was later raised to $100m.
On the second day of the elders' visit to Darfur, tempers flared when the former US president had an altercation with security officials after being barred from meeting an elder in North Darfur.
"I don't think you have the authority to do so. We are going to go anyway," Mr Carter is reported as shouting to Sudanese security men.
He later agreed to a compromise to meet the representative at a different location, AP news agency reports.
A human rights organisation says it has evidence that Darfuris who have been sent back to Khartoum by the UK government have been tortured.

THE ELDERS
South Africa's Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Former US President Jimmy Carter
Children's rights advocate Graca Machel
Veteran UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi

The Aegis trust says that a number of Darfuris were severely abused and assaulted in Sudanese detention after being declared failed asylum seekers and deported by the British authorities.
In Darfur, the Nigerian general in charge of the AU force, Martin Luther Agwai, said his troops were outgunned and outnumbered by rebels and militias.
The new, combined AU-UN force of 26,000 troop and police is supposed to be deployed by 1 January 2008 but Gen Agwai said few African countries had the resources to be effective.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu told the BBC it was essential that the international community made the new peacekeeping force fit for its purpose.
"We need to have the hybrid force deployed as quickly as possible. It's awful that it should be allowed to be here when it is so inadequately equipped."
About 7,000 AU troops from 26 countries are currently patrolling the region, an area roughly the size of France.
Gen Agwai said he did not expect improvement in the situation on the ground until the 26,000-strong joint AU-UN force is deployed.
At least 200,000 people have died and some two million forced from their homes during the four-year conflict in Darfur.

BBC NEWS REPORT.