A United Nations envoy is due in Sudan today amid condemnation of the government in Khartoum for its treatment of civilians in the western Darfur region.
The senior official, Lakhdar Brahimi, will hold talks aimed at obtaining Sudanese government approval for the deployment of UN peacekeepers in Darfur.
Aid agencies have been particularly vocal of the need for UN troops on the ground.
Despite a peace deal signed by the government and the main Darfur rebel groups on 5 May, dozens of people have been killed in clashes between rebels and government-armed militias.
An African Union peacekeeping force remains cash-strapped and ill-equipped.
The Sudanese government initially resisted UN intervention and said such a deployment would cause an Iraq-like quagmire that would attract Islamist militants into attacking the UN troops.
But since the May peace deal was struck, Khartoum has softened its stance and the UN Security Council has adopted a resolution that envisages UN peacekeepers taking over from the 7,000 AU troops.
UN report highlights atrocities
A report, delivered to the UNSC on Monday, said atrocities were driving people from their homes and swelling the population in the region's squalid camps.
The report said 80,000 people have currently no access to vital services, around 1,000 children per month no longer receive routine vaccinations, and a polio immunisation campaign had to be suspended for 20,000 children under the age of five.
Rebels took up arms in Darfur in early 2003, accusing the Arab-dominated central government of neglecting Darfur.
Khartoum backed so-called Janjaweed militias, drawn from Arab tribes, to crush the rebels.
A subsequent campaign of murder, looting, rape and arson has driven more than 2.5 million people from their homes into camps in Darfur and neighbouring Chad.
