They are called the S-5, or the Small Five, a group of small and middling U.N. member states that have been informally meeting since 2005 to try and chip away at the unchecked powers of the P-5, the U.N.'s dominant, permanent five members of the Security Council.

And they are heading for a confrontation next week with the five big powers -- Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States -- over an initiative in the General Assembly aimed at pressing the P-5 to voluntarily cede some of their powers.

On May 16, the S-5 will press for a vote on a resolution before the U.N. General Assembly that calls on the veto wielding powers to refrain "from using a veto to block council action aimed at preventing or ending genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity." It also requests that in cases where a permanent member ignored the General Assembly's advice and exercises its veto, it should at least explain why it did so.

The push for a vote comes at a time when the U.N. Security Council has faced criticism for acting too slowly to contain the escalating violence, and in the wake of two key powers, Russia and China, having cast vetoes twice to block an Arab League initiative aimed at ending the violence in Syria and that would force President Bashar al-Assad from power. Russia, which has argued that its diplomatic strategy stands a better chance of lessening the violence, has been among the sharpest critics of theS-5 initiative, characterizing it as an affront to Moscow, according to a senior diplomat involved in the negotiations.

The veto power has long been a source of resentment among the U.N.'s broader membership, who believe that it places the big powers above the law, shielding them and their friends from the edicts they routinely enforce on the rest of the world.

But for the United States, Russia, and other big powers, the veto represents the most important check on international intrusion into their spheres of influence by a sometimes unsympathetic majority. The United States, for instance, has routinely used its veto power to shield Israel from Security Council measures demanding it show greater restraint in its dealings with the Palestinians. China and Russia, meanwhile, have exercised the veto to block condemnation of friendly countries, including Myanmar and Zimbabwe, from condemnation for committing rights abuses.

A number of economic heavyweights and emerging powers, including Brazil, Germany, Japan, India, Nigeria, and South Africa, have been clamoring for a greater say in the council's deliberations, leading to several proposals that would expand the 15-nation Security Council and grant a number of rising powers a permanent seat.

The S-5 -- Costa Rica, Jordan, Liechtenstein, Singapore, and Switzerland -- realize that they have no hope of ever becoming big powers with permanent seats on the council. So they have devoted their efforts to pushing for reforms in the way the 15-nation council does business. Indeed, their recommendations on the use of the veto are a part of a broader menu of suggestions, including more P-5 consultations with states that aren't serving in the Security Council, that they intend to put before the General Assembly as a way to encourage reforms in the way the council works.

The sponsors say they are confident that they will have support from more than 100 of the assembly's 193 member states. But the P-5 have made it clear they want nothing to do with it, arguing that the U.N. Charter intended the victorious powers of World War II to manage threats to international security. While the vote would not be legally binding it could serve to ramp up political pressure on the big powers to change.

Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United States, and top diplomats from Britain, China, France, and Russia met with the S-5 on Wednesday in an effort to get them to back down.

Rice also pointed out that there were many other countries, not only the P-5, that have expressed opposition to a General Assembly vote. Another bloc of countries, known as the Uniting for Consensus group, which includes countries like Italy, Pakistan, and Argentina, also oppose a vote -- saying that it would distract from efforts to negotiate an enlargement of the Security Council.

Rice, who did most of the talking, told the group that while they recognize their pioneering effort to reform the council, their resolution would actually undercut the efforts to make the council more transparent. Rice asked them not go ahead with the resolution, according to Paul Seger, Switzerland's U.N. ambassador.

"They tell us don't put that resolution to a vote; it's infringing on the prerogatives of the Security Council, it's disruptive and could jeopardize the overall reform of the Security Council," Seger told Turtle Bay. "My sense is that they are afraid that certain prerogatives, certain acquired rights, are being questioned for the first time."

Mark Lyall Grant, Britain's U.N. ambassador, told Turtle Bay that the U.N. Security Council has undertaken many of the reforms being sought by the S-5, but their decision to bring the matter before the General Assembly would likely result in a "divisive vote that sets back the overall cause of reform."

"The Security Council must be always able to adapt and operate with flexibility in order fulfill its responsibilities under the Charter to meet the evolving challenges to international peace and security," he added in a statement. "But for that effectiveness and adaptability, it needs to be confident in its own decisions and procedures. It ultimately must remain the master of its own rules of procedure, as stated in the U.N. Charter."

Seger and other members of the S-5 say they are not looking for a fight -- but they also say it's unfair for the Security Council to ask other states to send their peacekeepers into harm's way, as Switzerland has in Syria, without including them in informal council deliberations on the situation there. The group, meanwhile, has marshaled a series of legal and political arguments to bolster its case that the majority of U.N. membership should have some role in advising the 15-nation council. They invoked Article 10 of the U.N. Charter, which permits the U.N. General Assembly to make recommendations to the Security Council, except in cases where the council is managing an international "dispute or situation."

Jordan's U.N. ambassador, Prince Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein, told Turtle Bay that there is also a legal case to be made that the U.N. Charter itself places limits on the rights of the council's permanent members to veto council action aimed at preventing mass killings. He argued that while the council bears "primary responsibility" for the maintenance of peace and security it also requires decisions be made in "conformity with the principle of justice and international law." Genocide and mass slaughter, he said, are certainly not in conformity with those principles, he said.

"We don't want to go up against the P-5," Seger added. "We don't question the right of the veto we only ask them kindly: Would you consider not using the veto in situations of atrocities, crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide?"

Seger, who also serves as chairman of the U.N. peace-building commission for Burundi, recalled an invitation to brief the Security Council on a visit he had made to that Central African country.. He briefed the council on his findings, and then was asked to leave as the council went behind closed doors for its own discussions on the matter.

"I asked Churkin, 'could I maybe just sit there, be a resource person?'" Seger said, referring to Russia's U.N. envoy Vitaly Churkin. "He said, 'No. We cannot open the council consultations to outsiders: It's never been done and it will never be done in the future.'"

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Kofi Annan, the special envoy on Syria, provided the U.N. Security Council this week with another maddeningly inconclusive update on his peace plan.

Yes, Syria has stopped shelling residential neighborhoods. No, it has not stopped its crackdown or called off its snipers.

In essence, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has provided just enough good behavior to keep the diplomatic initiative alive and U.N. sanctions at bay.

The depressing reality, say U.N. diplomats, is that while the Annan plan offers slim hope of bringing about serious political change in Syria it is being kept afloat by the simple fact that no one has a better plan, and no major outside power is willing to commit the military resources to challenge Assad's rule.

The diplomacy played out against a background of mounting uncertainty in Syria, as an unidentified group detonated a massive explosion near a team of U.N. observers. "It is a testament to the difficulty and the danger of the task entrusted to our U.N. observers, and it is a reminder of the risks of violence escalating even further," U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the U.N. General Assembly today.

Meanwhile, the Syrian government's security strategy has shifted as the government has come to pursue a low-intensity security operation to crush dissent while limiting the U.N. monitors' freedom of movement. Ban expressed frustration at the "growing numbers of arrest and allegations of brutal torture" as well as an "alarming upsurge in the use of IEDs, and other explosive devices throughout the country."

Under questioning from Western diplomats, the U.N.'s peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, told the Security Council behind closed doors on Tuesday that while there has been a "noticeable reduction" in the use of heavy weapons and shelling in residential areas there have been a continuation of lower-scale military operations, including sniper fire, and widespread arrests, according to council diplomats who heard the briefing.

"The shift suggests more of a change in tactics rather than a change of heart," said a council diplomat present at the meeting. "Ladsous made it clear that the violent incidents continue."
In his public statement, Annan has presented a gloomy, but highly cautious and balanced account of events on the ground, noting that both the government and the opposition have violated the terms of an April 12 cease-fire he brokered.

"There has been some decrease in the military activities but there are still serious violations in the cessation of violence that was agreed and the levels of violence and abuses are unacceptable," Annan told reporters in Geneva on Tuesday. "Government troops and armor are still present, though in smaller formations. There have been worrying episodes of violence by the Government, but we have also seen attacks against Government forces, troops and installations, and there has been a spate of bombings which are really worrying."

But Annan said that "the presence of our observers, and, in situations where they have intervened specifically, have not only had a calming effect, but sometimes they have been able to get the forces involved to do the right thing."

Behind closed doors, Ladsous said that despite numerous efforts by Syrian security forces to prevent the U.N. from patrolling sensitive areas they have ultimately secured access to the places they need to see.

But he outlined the challenges that U.N. monitors are facing in Syria, saying the U.N. has been unable to secure an agreement from Syria to allow the monitors to travel on their own planes and helicopters within the country.

Ladsous dismissed a suggestion by Russia's U.N. envoy Vitaly Churkin that the U.N. simply paint some Syrian military helicopters white, the standard color of U.N. vehicles, and use them, saying it would risk undermining the blue helmets independence and endanger their lives.

Those U.N. monitors that patrol on ground have been subject to highly intrusive "surveillance" by security forces closely shadowing the U.N. inspectors, scaring civilians from talking to the monitors. He also cited reports that opposition figures who met with the monitors have been subsequently targeted by Syrian security. "

Ladsous said the monitors are under constant surveillance and sometimes it is intrusive," said a council diplomat.

On May, 4, Syrian security agents blocked a U.N. convoy at a checkpoint near Daraa, and pointed loaded weapons at the unarmed blue berets, Ladsous told the council. The standoff was resolved when a more senior Syrian official intervened, apologized, and let them on their way.

Despite the setbacks, both Ladsous and Annan said that the small contingent of U.N. monitors in Syria were having a "calming" influence on events and that the best way to build on it was to deploy more monitors.

"I know lots of questions have been asked about what happens if the plan fails," Annan said. "I am waiting for some suggestions as to what else we do. I think if there are better ideas, I will be the first to jump onto it.... We may well conclude down the line that it doesn't work and a different tack has to be taken. And that will be a very sad day."

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The World Bank delivered an extraordinarily blunt warning to South Sudan's leadership over two months ago: their government's decision to halt oil production threatens to cripple the country's struggling economy, imperil its poorest citizens, and potentially bring about a total collapse of the state this summer.

South Sudan decided in January to suspend its production of oil, which accounts for over 80 percent of the economy (and 98 percent of government spending), accusing Sudan of stealing more than $800 million in oil transported through a Sudanese pipeline. South Sudan may have won the vast majority of the Sudan's oil fields when it seceded last year, but marketing that oil requires transiting through the north's pipelines. Juba announced that it will hold off production until Khartoum stops siphoning the south's oil and agrees to more competitive terms to transit oil through Sudan's pipelines or a new pipeline through Kenya be built, cutting Khartoum out altogether.

Marcelo Giugale, World Bank's director of economic policy and poverty reduction programs for Africa, outlined this dire account in a briefing to South Sudan's President Salva Kiir and some of his top ministers on February 29. Giugale then recounted his meeting with Kiir in a subsequent March 1 briefing to U.N. officials and representatives of several countries that provide financial assistance to South Sudan, according to a memo recorded and drafted by another participant at the meeting, and marked "Close Hold: not for distribution or attribution." The contents of the memo were first reported by the Sudan Tribune.

"In his opening statement, Mr. Giugale said that the World Bank has never seen a situation as dramatic as the once faced by South Sudan," according to a copy of the memo, which was obtained by Turtle Bay. "In is view, neither the president nor the senior ministers present in the meeting were aware of the economic implications of the shutdown. He candidly said that the decision was shocking and that the officials present had not internalized nor understood the consequences of the decision."

Those consequences, he warned, include a "dramatic contraction of the economy"  brought about by a "collapse of Gross Domestic Product," which is almost entirely dependent on oil revenue. The country's economic straits, he added, will put "catastrophic pressure" on South Sudan's currency, the pound.

"The currency will almost certainly collapse," triggering an "exponential" rise in inflation, Giugale said. "There will be a run for the dollars and families with dollars will almost certainly shift them outside the country -- by walking them out if necessary."

Giugale said that the government ‘s fiscal reserves will likely run out in July if the government continues to impose a set of planned austerity measures "at which point state collapse becomes a real possibility.  Even if some of the more draconian measures which are being discussed are adopted, reserves will hold only through October."

The World Bank declined to explicitly confirm the authenticity of the Giugale memo but a bank official confirmed that the bank routinely provides "technical and economic analysis to the government, and recently provided an assessment of the economic situation as requested by the Government of South Sudan."

"The World Bank is deeply concerned with the economic and development impact of the unresolved oil issues and how this will affect the people of both South Sudan and Sudan, particularly the most vulnerable," the World Bank official told Turtle Bay in a statement. "The ongoing dialogue between the World Bank and South Sudan focuses on positive steps that can be taken to manage the different economic scenarios arising out of its oil dispute with Sudan."

The World Bank official said that the bank "will continue to work closely with both South Sudan and Sudan to support the countries through their economic difficulties, focusing on economic resilience, the protection of vulnerable people from economic hardship, as well as longer-term development needs." "Given the desperate living situation being faced by people in both Sudan and South Sudan, the World Bank's economic analysis unambiguously shows that it is in the interests of both countries to resume talks urgently and resolve their ongoing dispute over oil payments and other issues peacefully," the official added.

South Sudan, which gained its independence last July, inherited the country's major oil fields, but the landlocked states depends on Sudan's oil pipeline to move its crude to Port Sudan on the Red Sea, The two countries have been engaged in a bitter quarrel over transit fees that has contributed to propelling the two countries to the brink of war.

South Sudan's leader has argued that it has endured economic hardships for decades and it can withstand a few more of economic pain in order to ensure greater control over its oil wealth. "In their discussion with Mr. Giugale, the government reiterated its position that South Sudanese people have suffered for years and will be prepared to suffer again," reads the meeting notes of the World Bank briefing. "They evidenced little understanding of the impact of the oil shutdown and insisted that they will find a way forward."

Francis Nazario, South Sudan's new U.N. representative, told Turtle Bay that "we are facing indeed some financial problems as a result of shutting of the oil production, but we have other options for raising revenues, including greater development of the agricultural and livestock sector. In the meantime, he said that South Sudan is working to build a new oil refinery and a new pipeline within the next two years to transit its oil through Kenya. Nazario said his government is willing to reconsider its position if Sudan, which has demanded around $36 dollar per barrel in transit fees, agrees to standard international fees, which he said are less than $1 a barrel. Khartoum's terms, according to officials from the south, would make it impossible to benefit from its oil wealth.

In the memo, Giugale dismissed the government's contention that it could absorb the economic shocks, saying that that the collapse of the economy is most likely to "result in social and political fragmentation, unrest and instability."

Notably, the move is set to bring about a rapid reversal of some of South Sudan's most impressive development gains, increasing the proportion of the population living in poverty from 51 percent this year to 83 percent in 2013, and placing 3.6 million additional people below the poverty line, according to Giugale's estimate.(90 percent of South Sudan's population lived under the poverty line in 2004). The new measures would also bring about a doubling of child mortality rates for children under five, rising from 10 percent of live births currently to 20 percent in 2013 (yet still below 25 percent level seen in 2004).

"One of the most dramatic consequences will be deepening food insecurity linked directly to spiraling inflation," the memo stated. "Drawing on WFP data, the World Bank dismissed the idea that the large segment of the population which does not participate in the cash economy will be insulated from the impact of the shutdown."

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The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously today on a resolution condemning South Sudan and Sudan for conducting cross border attacks against one another and threatened possible sanctions if they don't stop fighting and resume political talks aimed at resolving their political and economic differences.

The council's action reflected mounting concern that a surge of fighting between the Khartoum and Juba could pitch the country into a bloody new era of conflict. "The fighting must stop and stop now," Susan E. Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told the council after the vote. "The current conflict between Sudan and South Sudan is on the verge of becoming a full scale and sustained war."

It is the first time the council has threatened to impose sanctions against Sudan in more than six years, and it is the first time it has ever issued such a threat against the South. Russia and China expressed reservation about the wisdom of threatening such measures, but agreed to support the resolution because the African Union supported it.

Today's vote throws the 15-nation council weight behind an African Union blueprint for peace, and requires the two sides to "unconditionally" resume talks within two weeks to settle a variety of long-standing disputes, including agreements over oil rights and the demarcation of borders and contested territories.

The outbreak of fighting between Sudan and South Sudan constitutes the most serious deterioration of a U.S.-brokered peace process that led to the South declaration of independence in July 2011. The 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement agreement ended a 28-year civil war between the north and the south and paved the way for the South's independence. But the two sides failed to resolve a number of outstanding issues, including dispute over the sharing of oil revenues, and differences over several disputed areas.

Acting under Chapter Seven of the U.N. Charter, which is legally binding, the council demands that the two countries "immediately cease all hostilities, including aerial bombardments" that Khartoum is reportedly conducting inside Sudan. It requires that both parties formally convey their commitment to the council to do so within 48 hours.

The text also demands that the two sides "unconditionally withdraw" their armed forces to their own side of the border, and cease any harboring or military support for rebel groups seeking the overthrow of their neighbors governments. 

Following the vote, South Sudan's minister of cabinet affairs Deng Alor said that his government would comply with the council's demand and resume talks. But Sudan's U.N. ambassador, Daffa-Alla Elhag Ali Osman, denied that his government had bombarded target in South Sudan and that it would not comply with all the council's demands, saying it may it would be difficult to resume talks with the south if it ends "all forms of support and sheltering of proxy and rebel armed groups." He also objected to a provision of the resolution that "strongly calls" on Sudan, as well as anit-government rebels, to accept a U.N. backed proposal to allow humanitarian access into South Kordofan and Blue Nile.

The resolution calls on U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon to brief the council every two weeks on whether Sudan, South Sudan and anti-government armed groups in South Kordofan and Blue Nile are meeting their obligations. "In the even that any or all of the parties have not complied" with its obligation that council will "take appropriate additional measures...as necessary."

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Richard Grenell, the foreign policy and national security spokesman for Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney, announced his resignation yesterday, giving up the kind of high-profile political job he had coveted through much of his professional life.

Here at the United Nations, where he served for 8 years as the Bush administration's press spokesman, Grenell's political fall set off some reflexive expressions of glee from insiders, who had been stunned by Grenell's appointment and initially thought he'd been ousted for posting inflammatory and derisive tweets targeting everyone from Michelle Obama to Calista Gingrigh.

But as people began to realize that Grenell may have been forced out of his job because of opposition from social and religious conservatives -- not on his merits or lack thereof but because of his sexuality -- a twinge of guilt set in. "I take back the snarky comment," said one U.N. insider, who initially hailed news of Grenell's political demise with a laugh. "He had to resign ... because he is openly gay!"

In a statement posted on Jennifer Rubin's Right Turn Blog, which broke the news, Grenell said he decided to resign because "my ability to speak clearly and forcefully on the issues has been greatly diminished by the hyper-partisan discussion of personal issues that sometimes comes from a presidential campaign." He thanked Governor Romney "for his belief in me and my abilities and his clear message to me that being openly gay was a non-issue for him and his team."

R. Clark Cooper, the executive director of the Log Cabin Republicans, said Grenell made his decision because it is "best for the Romney campaign" if it was unfortunate that "the hyper-partisan discussion of issues unrelated to Ric's national security qualifications threatened to compromise his effectiveness on the campaign trail...."   

"Ric was essentially hounded by the far right and far left," he said. "The Romney campaign has lost a well-known advocate of conservative ideas and a talented spokesman, and I am certain he will remain an active voice for a confident U.S. foreign policy."

Grenell is a well-known, if not terribly popular figure at the United Nations, where he served as spokesman for every one of President George W. Bush's U.N. envoys, including John Negroponte, John Danforth, John Bolton and Zalmay Khalilzad.  The son of Christian missionaries from the Church of God, Grenell preferred the role of political enforcer to that of the foreign policy wonk, routinely accusing reporters of anti-Republican bias.

Grenell regarded his famously combative relationship with the press -- detailed in this Village Voice article -- as a badge of honor, and Bolton and other foreign policy conservatives rallied to his defense when his tweets -- he once accused Vice President Joe Biden of using botox -- raised questions about his judgment and maturity.

"During his time at the U.S. Mission to the U.N., he showed discretion and good judgment, and did an excellent job representing our country during often very difficult circumstances," Bolton said in a statement. The Washington Post reported that Bolton sought to persuade Grenell not to resign. Romney's campaign manager, Matt Rhoades, meanwhile, said "We are disappointed that Ric decided to resign from the campaign for his own personal reasons. We wanted him to stay because he had superior qualifications for the position he was hired to fill."

But Grenell's foreign policy tenure was not without controversy.

In February 2003, a Mexican reporter at the U.N. published a story claiming that Grenell had pushed Mexico's U.N. ambassador, Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, to "hurry up" his remarks to the press so that Negroponte, who was waiting in the wings for a chance to address the media, could speak. "Who cares what Mexico has to say?" he reportedly said.

The report set off a diplomatic storm in Mexico, where it was widely reported, and Negroponte, a former U.S. ambassador to Mexico seeking the country's backing for the Iraq war, had to smooth things over with the Mexican envoy. At the time, there were rumors that the comments had been picked up on a reporter's tape recorder. But a recording never materialized, Grenell categorically denied it, and the U.S. State Department issued a statement defending him.

After leaving government, Grenell continued to monitor events at the U.N., tweeting and writing an occasional op-ed piece for Fox News or the Huffington Post that savaged Susan Rice's tenure at the United Nations and mocked the press as going to soft on her. "If she won't voluntarily resign then she should be fired," he wrote in one Fox News op-ed.

He even found time to take an occasional pot shot at me. After I retweeted a story by my colleague Glenn Kessler taking issue with Romney's characterization of Russia as America's principal geostrategic foe, Grenell fired back with a tweet comparing us to Sergeant Shultz in the 1960's sitcom Hogan's Heroes, and linking to a YouTube video with him relaying his classic line "I know nothing."

Every several months, a U.N. Panel of Experts issues a report documenting Sudan's extensive violations of U.N. Security Council sanctions in Darfur, and pleads with the council's big powers to use their influence to persuade Khartoum and anti-government rebel groups to comply.

And every time, their appeals for backup are largely ignored, especially by China and Russia, which supply Khartoum with some of the arms and firepower that fuel Darfur's fighting, and which have routinely refused to fully cooperate with the panel's experts as they seek to trace the origins of prohibited weapons from factories in China and Russia.

Three former panel members, Claudio Gramizzi of Italy, Michael Lewis of Britain, and Jerome Tubiana of France, recently produced an unofficial report arguing that the international commitment to sanctions had eroded so much that even the United Nations itself was flouting the sanctions, facilitating the travel of a rebel field commander, Jibril Abdul Kareem, nicknamed "Tek," who was subject to a Security Council travel ban, to peace talks in Doha, Qatar.

The Tek episode is simply one nugget buried away in a confidential 80-plus page report, first reported by Africa Confidential, that documents systematic violations of a six-year-old U.N. arms embargo, travel ban, and asset freeze, imposed on Khartoum and rebel leaders in an effort to contain the violence in Sudanese province.

But the episode provides a depressing illustration of how an initiative that once enjoyed the enthusiastic backing of the council's major Western powers -- the United States, Britain, and France -- has become such a low priority that few key players in the region take it seriously anymore.

The Security Council first imposed an arms embargo on armed groups in Darfur in 2004, and expanded it the following year to include the government. The council also slapped a travel ban and an asset freeze on the leaders of both pro-government and anti-government armed groups in Darfur, including the government backed militia known as the Janjaweed, which gained international notoriety for its scorched earth raids, conducted on camels and backed by Sudanese air power, against countless Darfurian villages.

The measures were designed to curtail a massive wave of violence -- that ultimately led to the death of at least 300,000 people and the displacement of many times that number -- and to constrain the Sudanese government from carrying out mass murder in Darfur.

The report's three authors resigned late last summer over a dispute with the panel's Indian coordinator, who produced a competing official report. The panel, they wrote, "suffered from a major dissension" within the ranks. The coordinator, they complained, had insisted that each of the panel's five members conduct their work independently without coordinating or sharing information, a policy they believed undermined the panel's effectiveness.  But officials familiar with the dispute said the difference ran much deeper, reflecting a lack of faith in the integrity and competence of the panel's leadership.  Eric Reeves, a Smith College literature professor and Sudan activist, has written his own take on the report, highlighting the dissidents' far more critical account of the human rights situation in Darfur than the authors of the official U.N. report.

The Security Council's enthusiasm for the U.N. panel's work waned years ago, according to experts. In 2009, Enrico Carisch, a former head of the sanctions panel, testified before Congress that the Security Council had failed to act on more than 100 panel recommendations aimed at strengthening the sanctions. He also faulted the United States, France, and Britain for doing little to force a more public debate.

Carisch, currently an independent consultant who trains U.N. panel experts, told Turtle Bay that the dissidents' decision to produce a "shadow" report highlighted some of the institutional weakness of the U.N. sanctions system. At the same time, he said their breadth of the findings highlight the value of their work. "The powerful evidence reported by these experts demonstrates how skillful and sustained sanctions monitoring is important to shine a light into the darkest corners of conflict areas," Carisch said.  

The dissidents' expert report assails Khartoum for systematically violating the arms embargo, thwarting efforts of U.N. experts to enforce sanctions, and conducting ethnic cleansing against the Zaghawa tribe. It documents Sudan's use of use of Chinese small-caliber ammunition, Russian Mi-24 attack helicopters, Ukrainian tanks, and Belarussian Sukhoi-25 fighter jets

But it also provides a devastating account of the U.N. panels' own efforts to monitor and enforce the U.N. sanctions. Indeed, the report challenges much of the underlying evidence used to justify sanctions against "Tek" and two other rebel leaders, Adam Yaqub and Musa Hilal, the latter a notorious Janjaweed leader. The reports, produced by a previous team of U.N. panel experts, were riddled with inaccuracies, including misspelled names and unsupportable claims. For instance, the report notes that there may have been ample evidence that Hilal commanded militia engaged in widespread atrocities in his stronghold in north Darfur. But it also expressed serious doubts that he was responsible for the crime the U.N. panel attributed to him to justify sanctions. 

In April 2006, the U.N. panel accused Hilal of leading a Sept. 28, 2005, militia raid on the West Darfur villages of Acho, Aro Sharrow, and Gozmena, to seek revenge for the death of one of his sons who was purportedly killed by a rebel movement linked to the towns. The dissidents' report, however, said Hilal did not lead West Darfur's militias and that "it is unproved and unlikely that Musa Hilal was responsible and/or present"  at the scene of the raids. The report also said it found no evidence that Hilal's son had been killed.

While the dissidents questioned the justification for Jibril's designation on the sanctions list they also argued that the U.N. still has an obligation to enforce those measures.  But on July 20, 2010, Jibril traveled to Qatar with a travel document -- known as a laissez passer -- issued by the deputy chief of staff of the United Nations-African Union Joint Mediation Support Team(JMST). The visit, which lasted a year, was part of a Qatari-led mediation effort to broker a peace settlement between Khartoum and several Darfuri rebel groups.

The dissident panel members said the U.N. violation of sanctions in this instance was unnecessary. A provision in the six-year-old sanctions resolution -- Resolution 1591 -- includes an exemption allowing travel for sanctioned individuals participating in peace initiatives. However, the exemption can only be approved by the Security Council committee that oversees sanctions.

"The members of the panel are unaware of any request by the JSMT or from UNAMID [The U.N. African Union Mission in Darfur] to the sanctions committee for permission to issue this document or to authorize the travel of Tek by air to Qatar," the report states. "Jibril ‘Tek's' presence in Doha represents a case of violation of the sanctions regime." 

But the larger issue, according to the dissidents, is what the episode says about the U.N.'s ability and commitment to apply its own sanctions fairly and with conviction. "Should access to Darfur, and more generally cooperation from member states, United Nations and African Union bodies working in or on Darfur, as well as the general ability of the panel to provide accurate justifications for individual sanctions and monitor them, not increase in the future, the very existence of both the panel and the sanctions mechanism should be seriously reconsidered."

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Special Envoy Kofi Annan told the U.N. Security Council today in a closed-door session that an expanding U.N. monitoring mission still stands a chance of calming the violence in Syria, despite a spike in killings on Monday, including a report of a government attack on civilians in the town of Hama after U.N. observers left the town.

Annan, a former U.N. secretary general who is serving as the joint U.N.-Arab League envoy for Syria, delivered a carefully worded briefing to the council that both raised concern about the government's conduct in recent weeks but urged the council to maintain support for his fragile diplomatic bid.

"Our patience has been tested severely-close to its limits," he said. "But we have also seen signs that there is the possibility for the parties to implement a cessation of violence, which can lead to a political process and peaceful way out of the crisis."

Annan said he intends to press ahead with his efforts to start political talks between the government and the fragmented political, civil and military opposition groups. He would approach the Syrian government at the "appropriate time," he said, and request that President Bashar al-Assad appoint a representative to the talks. At the same time, he said his team is pressing the opposition to develop a "more inclusive and representative" approach to political talks.

Annan said that while it is difficult for a handful of U.N. monitors to "assess the level of violence" throughout Syria, the scale of killing had "as a whole" decreased since the U.N.-brokered cease-fire took effect on April 12. However, the violence spiked yesterday, he admitted, citing an upsurge of killing in Hama, where government forces reportedly attacked civilians in a suburb of the town following a visit by U.N. monitors.

"I am concerned by media reports that, before and after [U.N.] observer visits, government troops have been active in civilian areas and launched attacks," he said. "I am particularly alarmed by reports that government troops entered Hama yesterday after observers departed, firing automatic weapons and killing a significant number of people."

The move comes as the U.N. Security Council is straining to maintain its unity despite widely divergent approaches by the council's key powers. The United States -- and its European and Arab allies -- have begun clamoring for a tougher approach to Syria, arguing that a resort to sanctions, and possibly stepped-up support for the armed opposition, is required to prod the government into meeting its obligations. Russia and China, meanwhile, have preferred an exclusively diplomatic strategy backed, reinforced by diplomatic pressure on both sides to pursue political talks.

Annan, meanwhile, held out the hope that a beefed up U.N. monitoring mission, which may expand to a force of some 300 unarmed observers in the coming weeks, could restore calm, citing the reduction of violence in the town of Homs following the arrival of U.N. observers. "There is a chance to expand and consolidate the cessation of violence," he said. "Observers not only see what is going on, but their presence has the potential to change the political dynamics."

Annan concluded that Syria's compliance with its commitments under his peace plan -- known as the six-point plan -- has been "partial" at best, noting that the "gestures" the government has taken so far "do not yet amount to the full and clear signal" of its commitment to embrace political reform. But he also hinted that any political settlement he is likely to deliver will involve moral compromises.

"Under the circumstances, the peace we are trying to build could never be perfect -- and we have all been shocked by events in Syria," he said. "But if we succeed, the prospects are far better than any promised through war."

Annan said that he had received written assurances on Saturday from Syrian Foreign Minister Wallid Moallem that "the withdrawal of massed troops and heavy weapons from in and around population centers is now complete and military operations have ceased."  Annan said he was "encouraged" by Moallem's pledge but that "it should be understood that the only promises that count are the promises that are kept."

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The United States and its European allies are heading for another dust up in the Security Council over the strategy for reinforcing a shaky U.N.-brokered cease-fire, according to U.N. diplomats.

The council's European powers, Britain and France, tabled a draft resolution that would require Syria meet its commitment to provide U.N. monitors with freedom of movement and unimpeded access to any sources in the country or face the threat of U.N. sanctions. Russia, meanwhile, is now pushing a competing resolution that would not threaten Syria with any fresh penalties if fails to comply with its requirements. (See note below)

The competing drafts both support a proposal by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to establish a full-fledged U.N. monitoring mission of at least 300 blue berets, and likely more down the road, with freedom of movement and unimpeded access to individuals within Syria.

But the Western draft, which was distributed to the council by France, goes much further, condemning Syria's violent repression of civilians during the past year, and places sharper demands on Damascus to order their forces back to the barracks.

The Western draft also included a provision, which is being hotly contested by Moscow, threatening to adopt measures under article 41 of the U.N. charter -- a reference to sanctions -- if Syria fails to meet its "commitments in their entirety"  to "withdraw its troops and heavy weapons from population centers to their barracks to facilitate a sustained cessation of violence."

On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that governments need to "start moving very vigorously in the Security Council" towards the adoption of a sanctions resolution including travel, financial sanctions, and an arms embargo to pressure the regime to comply with special emissary Kofi Annan's six-point peace plan. But she acknowledged that Russia is still likely to veto any U.N. resolution imposing sanctions on Syria. She also voiced concern about the viability of the new observer mission, raising the prospects, however unlikely, that the council may pull the plug on a U.N. mission before it gets fully going.

"We're in a dilemma," she said. "We think it's important to get independent sources of observation and reporting on the ground, but we do not want to create a situation where those who are sent in to do this mission themselves are subjected to violence."

The latest diplomatic scuffle comes one day after the U.N. and Syria reached agreement this week on a so-called "preliminary agreement" that sets the operating terms for a small team of U.N. monitors that have struggled in recent days to test the will of the Syrian government to let them document abuses in a conflict that may have left more than 11,000 dead.

The new 8-page pact -- which was obtained by Turtle Bay from a U.N. diplomat -- furnishes the monitors with some vital powers, including the authority to import communications equipment and conduct unobstructed communications with U.N. headquarters, that a failed Arab League monitoring mission earlier this year lacked.

But there remain unresolved matters: for instance, Syria has not yet agreed to permit the U.N. to bring in its own planes or helicopters to transport the monitors to a hot spot at a moment's notice. The U.N.'s assistant secretary general for peacekeeping, Edmond Mulet, told the Security Council behind closed doors on Thursday that a pact on U.N. air assets is vital to the monitors' success and that the U.N. would try to strike a deal with the Syrians by the time an expanded U.N. monitoring mission could be deployed.

So far, Ban and other top U.N. officials say that while Syria has yet to fully meet its obligations to withdraw troops and heavy weapons from Syrian towns, and though it initially blocked the observer team from traveling to the city of Homs, they still believe there is value in expanding the size of the U.N. monitoring mission over the coming weeks, and reinforcing its technical capacity.

After three days of frustrating patrols aimed at testing their freedom of movement, the monitors took a break from their patrols today. Ahmed Fawzi, the chief spokesman for Annan, told Turtle Bay the monitors were "regrouping, reassessing" and planning for a new round of patrols on Saturday.

U.N. officials said that the monitors are straining to find a way to do their work under conditions that are complicated by the intensive interest of media, who have been tracking their every step, the large crowds that have poured into the streets to greet them during patrols, a loosely organized armed opposition, and a government that has not yet fully resigned itself to its commitment to submit to outside scrutiny.

A routine patrol to the town of Arbeen underscored the risks of monitoring in a country that remains in a state of conflict. A U.N. convoy was approached by a crowd of protesters that "forced UN vehicles to a checkpoint," according to a report by Ban to the UNSC.  "Subsequently, the crowd was dispersed by firing projectiles. Those responsible for the firing could not be ascertained by the United Nations Military Observers."

Ban wrote that that "it remains a challenge to  assess accurately unconfirmed and conflicting reports of developments in Syria. He said that while "levels of violence dropped markedly" in the days following a April 12 U.N.-brokered cease-fire, "violent incidents and reports of casualties have escalated again in recent days, with reports of shelling of civilian areas and abuses by government forces. The Government reports violent actions by armed groups. The cessation of armed violence in all its forms is therefore clearly incomplete."

(note: an earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that the U.S. joined Britain and France in tabling a draft resolution on U.N. monitors. However, the U.S. was closely involved in the drafts preparation, according to a council source. The council is currently negotiating on the basis of the Russian text.) 

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