Omar al-Bashir, the Sudan-ese president, has been formally charged with genocide in Darfur by the prosecutor of the Inter-national Criminal Court, a move that threatens to cause further instability in Sudan and puts the ICC's credibility on the line.

Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the ICC's chief prosecutor, said he could no longer "stay silent" over the campaign of murder, rape and displacement being carried out in Sudan's Darfur region, where about 300,000 people have been killed and 2.5m forced from their homes since 2003, according to United Nations estimates.