By Michelle Nichols UNITED NATIONS, April 2 (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said on Monday that he wants more time to convince Sudan to accept a large "hybrid" peacekeeping force in Darfur before Britain and the United States push for Security Council sanctions. "Before we talk about the sanctions, let me have some more political space to deal with this dialogue with them," Ban told reporters after returning from an 11-day Middle East trip. The United States is working closely with Britain, which takes over the presidency of the Security Council for April, and is planning a new resolution on Darfur that could include sanctions. Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has hesitated on allowing U.N. peacekeepers into Darfur, where experts say at least 200,000 people have been killed and 2.5 million displaced since 2003, when rebel groups took up arms against Khartoum. Khartoum says only 9,000 people have died and denies U.S. allegations of genocide. Ban also deplored the killing of five African Union (A.U.) peacekeepers in Darfur on Sunday and said it "illustrates the necessity and urgency of dispatching hybrid peacekeepers to Darfur." The three-stage U.N. plan is to deploy several hundred support staff for the 7,000 A.U. troops now in Darfur, who would be followed by 4,000 U.N. troops, before a hybrid force of nearly 20,000 U.N. and A.U. troops is created. But while Bashir agreed on the three stages, he has since hesitated on the details and number of troops, while the overburdened U.N. peacekeeping department is far from ready. Ban met Bashir at an Arab summit in Saudi Arabia last week and Bashir agreed to allow U.N. logistical support for the A.U. force. Ban said he would give an informal report on his progress to the Security Council on Thursday. "We have achieved some improvement and result through this political dialogue," he said. Ban said he will send U.N. peacekeeping experts to Addis Ababa as early as next week to meet with the African Union to discuss the second stage of the U.N. plan. He then plans to hold talks with A.U. Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare in New York on April 16-17. "We will continue to discuss what measures will have to be taken further to make progress," Ban said.
