Mia Farrow urges UN action on Central African Rep

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 28 (Reuters) Actress Mia Farrow urged the United Nations to send peacekeepers to Central African Republic and save it from becoming a failed state by stemming a flow of violence from neighboring Sudan and Chad.

The award-winning film star visited the impoverished nation earlier this month as a goodwill ambassador for the UN children's fund, UNICEF, and described its people as terrified, traumatized and ''utterly neglected'' by the most of the world.

''We will see hundreds of thousands of deaths in Central African Republic after the rainy season unless there's help coming,'' Farrow told a news conference. ''I don't see how this extremely fragile and completely abandoned population can possibly survive.'' ''It's been called the forgotten crisis, but that implies that it was once remembered. I don't know that it has been in the consciousness of the international community,'' she said.

The Security Council considered yesterday a report from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon recommending a peacekeeping force of nearly 11,000 for Chad and a ''security presence'' of about 500 personnel in the Central African Republic.

Farrow also wants peacekeepers in Chad, which has become caught up in violence spreading from Sudan's Darfur region.

She has long campaigned for a UN force to be sent to Darfur, where fighting between rebels and the Sudanese government began in 2003 and has now fueled rebellions in Central African Republic and Chad.

The Security Council has planned a Darfur mission of some 17,000 troops and 500 police. But Khartoum has not agreed to strengthening an African Union force of 7,000 now in Darfur.

Farrow appeared in ''Rosemary's Baby'' and a number of Woody Allen movies. She was once married to singer Frank Sinatra.

Reuters PDM VP1045