Sebastian Abbot
Associated Press Writer

Western countries looking for ways to pressure Sudan to curb violence in Darfur are getting little support from the Khartoum regime's Arab neighbors.

Egypt, whose president met Monday with Sudan's leader, has the greatest influence with its neighbor, but analysts said it is leery of pushing Khartoum for fear of jeopardizing access to Nile River water and because of Arab sentiment against outside interference in the region.

The meeting produced a call by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak for Sudan to pursue a comprehensive Darfur peace deal. But that echoes Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir's position that a broad peace accord should be the focus in Darfur, rather than a U.N. plan to deploy large numbers of peacekeepers.

A peace agreement was signed last year between al-Bashir's government and one rebel group in Darfur, but it has failed to stop four years of fighting that has killed more than 200,000 people and displaced 2.5 million. Other rebel factions called the deal insufficient.

Mubarak's spokesman, Suleiman Awad, told reporters that Egypt would provide army and police forces for an expanded Darfur peacekeeping mission only if a peace deal is reached.

Egypt announced last month that it would send 750 soldiers and 130 military supervisors for the next phase of U.N. troops deployed in Darfur, but Awad's statement indicated Egypt was placing conditions on that offer.

"Mubarak emphasized that Egypt sees no use of some international powers' inclination for increasing pressure on Sudan," Awad told reporters.

Mubarak, who also spoke about Darfur during a telephone call with President Bush on Monday, emphasized that dialogue and not sanctions will solve the conflict, Awad said. Egypt has opposed U.S. threats of sanctions if Sudan doesn't allow U.N. peacekeepers in Darfur.

Al-Bashir agreed in November to a U.N. plan to strengthen an ill-equipped force of 8,000 African Union peacekeepers in Darfur.

But it took five more months of talks before he recently gave the go-ahead for deploying 3,000 U.N. soldiers, police and civilian personnel and six attack helicopters. He still staunchly opposes the plan's final phase - creating a 20,000-soldier "hybrid" U.N.-AU force.

Analysts say one reason Cairo is supporting the Sudanese government is to preserve its access to the Nile River, which runs through Sudan before reaching Egypt.

Eric Reeves, a Sudan expert at Smith College in Massachusetts, said that includes backing Khartoum's efforts to prevent southern Sudan from voting for independence in a 2011 referendum that will be held under a 2005 peace agreement that ended a 21-year civil war in the south.

Sudan's government opposes secessions because much of the country's oil is in the south, and Egyptians fear an independent southern Sudan could jeopardize the amount of Nile water that reaches Egypt.

"What you see is a convergence of interest between Cairo and Khartoum," Reeves said.

While Washington is calling for the bigger peacekeeping force in Darfur, experts say the U.S. government is reluctant to pressure Egypt too strongly because it needs Egyptian help elsewhere in the region.

"The U.S. relationship with Egypt in other areas, like the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, is so central, so strategic, the U.S. doesn't want to hint at jeopardizing those other issues," said Tom Cargill, a Sudan specialist at Chatham House, a think tank in London.

Sudan's government has also played on Arab worries about outsiders by arguing that the arrival of U.N. troops in Darfur would signal the return of colonialism in Africa.

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Associated Press writer Nadia Abou el-Magd contributed to this report.