Nairobi/Khartoum  - Up to 250 people have died over the past week in tribal clashes in the restive western Sudanese province of Darfur, the peacekeeping mission in Darfur said.

The UN and African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) said that up to 150 people died when the Habbaniya ethnic group came under attack from the Fallata and Salamat groups in South Darfur.

Six police officers who tried to separate the warring parties were among the dead.

About 5,000 people were forced to flee their homes after their village was burned down, UNAMID said.

Another 100 were killed in fighting between subsections of the Gimir ethnic group, also in South Sudan.

Washington - US President George W Bush said Wednesday he was frustrated by the slow pace of the United Nations in building a peacekeeping force to halt the violence in Sudan's Darfur region.

"The pace of action out of the United Nations is too slow," Bush said after meeting a leading human rights activist for Darfur, Halima Bashir.

New York - UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday welcomed Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir's announcement of an immediate ceasefire in the troubled western region of Darfur.

Al-Bashir said the fighting should stop between the government's armed forces and warring factions and called for an effective monitoring mechanism to monitor the ceasefire. He also called for the disarming of militia forces.

Nairobi/Khartoum  - Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on Wednesday announced an immediate ceasefire in the conflict-ridden western province of Darfur.

"I hereby announce our immediate unconditional ceasefire between the armed forces and warring factions provided that an effective monitoring mechanism be put into action and be observed by all involved parties," the Sudan Tribune quoted al-Bashir as saying.

Nairobi/Khartoum  - Sudan and Chad restored diplomatic ties after six months of no diplomatic contact, a news report said Monday.

The two neighbouring African countries broke all diplomatic ties six months ago on mutual accusations of supporting rebel groups in the other country.

Sudan accuses the government in N'Djamena of support for rebels in its Darfur province, who earlier this year almost reached the capital Khartoum. Chad, on the other hand, accuses Sudan's leaders of being the power behind rebels in the east of their country.

Beijing/Khartoum - Five Chinese oil workers kidnapped in Sudan have been slain by their abductors, the Chinese embassy in Khartoum said.

Sudanese authorities told the embassy Monday that five of nine Chinese workers abducted on October 19 were killed, China's official Xinhua news agency reported.

Two more of the abducted workers were missing, and two escaped, the Sudanese government said.

The Sudan Tribune, quoting Foreign Ministry officials, said the bodies and the two escaped workers, who were injured, were found in a small village in the Kordofan area.

The embassy "strongly condemned" slayings and asked Khartoum to continue search operations for the two missing workers.