Around 30 African Union troops are missing this morning following a rebel attack in northern Darfur that killed at least 10 peacekeepers.
About 1,000 rebels from the Sudan Liberation Army attacked the AU base outside the town of Haskanita on Saturday after sunset, when Muslims break their daytime fast for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, AU officers said.
The rebels eventually stormed the base early yesterday.
The rebels used armoured vehicles and rocket-propelled grenades, an indication that they are more heavily armed than previously believed, peacekeepers said.
The Sudanese army routed the rebels early yesterday, and the remaining AU peacekeepers were evacuated under the protection of the army.
By afternoon, some government troops could be seen plundering goods from the burned-out camp as an AU armoured vehicle smoldered nearby. Rebels looted several AU armoured vehicles and jeeps and took a large amount of ammunition from the base before the Sudanese army drove them out, AU soldiers said.
At least 200,000 people have been killed in more than four years of conflict in Darfur, a region of western Sudan. The government is accused of unleashing Arab militias known as the janjaweed to fight ethnic African rebels.
The janjaweed are accused of the worst atrocities of the conflict, including rape and mass killings of innocent civilians.
Darfur rebels also have grown increasingly hostile to the AU peacekeepers, saying the force favours the government side. Several ambushes of AU forces in the past year have been blamed on the rebels.
But Saturday's raid was the first time since the AU mission was deployed in June 2004 that one of its bases has been overrun, though soldiers have been regularly attacked.
There are about 6,000 AU peacekeepers in the region.