Germany's Darfur Debate

German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung has already signaled he would be willing to dispatch troops in an effort to stop the ongoing killing of civilians in the region -- but his offer has drawn massive criticism by other party figures.

Some 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million people displaced in the Sudanese Darfur region since 2003.

The African Union has stationed 7,000 troops in the region and the international community has worked to support them logistically, but they have been able to achieve little so far.

Jan Egeland, the UN emergency relief coordinator, said the international community had "woke up too late" to the situation and must make a larger contribution to halt civilian causalities.

"Genocide in slow motion"

The United Nations has been contemplating sending a larger multilateral contingent to Darfur to establish peace in the region under its own command.

"If the current African Union mandate for Darfur were to be transferred into the hands of the United Nations, we would not be in a position to ignore such a development," Jung told German public television on Thursday.

"We couldn't just say 'no' to a UN request to contribute troops to a multinational effort to establish peace," he added.

German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said a multinational approach should be taken to addressing the violence.

"There would be African troops involved in such a mission alongside Asian troops and European troops," she said earlier this week. "Germany would have no right to stand on the sidelines -- after all, what we are witnessing in the Darfur region is a sort of genocide in slow motion."

Other lawmakers from Germany's grand coalition of Christian and Social Democrats, however, have heavily criticized what they call an untimely offer on the part of the defense minister.

Critics warn Germany to not interfere

Peter Ramsauer of the Christian Social Union, the Bavarian sister party to Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union, lashed out at the defense minister for not coordinating his statements on Darfur with parliamentary leaders.

In addition to stating his opposition to a larger German deployment in Sudan, Ramsauer also pointed out there has been no request from the United Nations for troops.

Head of the opposition free-market liberal Free Democratic Party Guido Westerwelle called Jung's campaign a "grave mistake" that went against Germany's post-World War II restraint on the foreign policy front.

Germany currently has 41 military observers stationed with UN forces in Sudan. The German cabinet agreed to extend the troops' mandate on Wednesday and set a deployment cap of 200 soldiers.

US could step-up pressure

Karsten Voigt, the German government's coordinator for transatlantic relations, said he is certain members of the US Democratic party will try and put more pressure on Europe, including Germany, to help resolve to Darfur conflict.

"Many US Democrats are indeed urging the European Union and NATO to become active in Darfur," Voigt said. "But right now I don't sense much willingness on the part of European partners to step into action, nor do I see any majority backing for such a mission in the German parliament."