(dpa) - British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has contacted the Sudanese government and rebels in Darfur, with an offer to hold peace talks in London, it was announced Sunday.
A spokesman for Brown said Sunday that British officials had offered to hold a summit "as soon as practicable," aimed at resolving the conflict in Sudan's war-torn province, where 200,000 have died and millions have been displaced since 2003.
The offer was made public on the Global Day for Darfur, organized by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Save Darfur Coalition.
In London, protesters will gather outside the Sudanese embassy where speakers will include Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, to demand an end to attacks on civilians.
A group of children from the war-torn province will meet the British International Development Minister, Shahid Malik, at No 10 Downing Street.
According to human rights groups, one million Sudanese children have been affected by the conflict, including the group meeting International Development minister Shahid Malik at Number 1O.
Brown said the impact on young people had been "nothing less than devastating," British media reported.
"Today, on the fifth Global Day for Darfur, the eyes of the world are rightly focused on the millions of men, women and children in the region who continue to start each day with the fear of violence, abduction, rape or death," he said.
He welcomed the start made at deploying a joint United Nations/African Union peacekeeping force but said faster progress was required.
"So far only 10,000 troops are in place and we need to do better than this," he said.
The "modest progress," also including an EU force in neighbouring Chad, had been matched by an intensification of violence to levels not seen since the start of the war," he said.
"The Sudanese Government has bombed villages, forcing people once again to flee their homes, and they continue to block the full deployment of the peacekeepers that they have already promised to allow access," he added.