Human Rights Watch urged the UN Security Council on Tuesday to impose sanctions on both the Sudanese government and the Arab militias it is accused of supporting in a brutal conflict driving black Africans out of Sudan’s Darfur region. A draft council resolution put forward by the United States calls on the Sudanese government to disarm the Janjaweed militias accused by some senior UN officials of conducting a scorched-earth campaign of ethnic cleansing in Darfur.

But the draft would impose an arms embargo and a travel ban only on the leaders of the Janjaweed.

Sudanese officials, said by many in the international community to be arming and backing the Janjaweed, would not immediately be subject to sanctions, although the resolution says that within 30 days of its adoption, the council would determine whether such measures should be imposed against others held responsible for atrocities in Darfur.

To punish the Janjaweed alone was to excuse the Sudanese officials, New York-based Human Rights Watch wrote the council.

“The Sudanese government continues to use these militias to carry out ‘ethnic cleansing.’ Now the Security Council must be prepared to intervene with more muscle,” said Jemera Rone, a researcher in the Human Rights Watch Africa division.

“Sudanese government officials should also be subject to travel and arms sanctions,” he said. “Disarming the Janjaweed would be a crucial step in protecting civilians in Darfur, but Khartoum has flagrantly broken its earlier promises to neutralize them.”