Turkey's deputy prime minister is to visit Sudan's troubled Darfur region this week to open what is likely Ankara's largest-ever foreign aid project, the Turkish ambassador said Monday.

Ravaged by 11 years of government-rebel warfare along with inter-Arab violence that worsened last year, Darfur has a severe shortage of health workers, a lack of infrastructure, and food scarcity.

Sudan and rebels in South Kordofan would adopt an immediate ceasefire and allow aid to reach more than one million people, says a proposed agreement issued as peace talks broke off last week.

AFP obtained a copy of the draft on Sunday.

Rebels rained rockets on the capital of Sudan's South Kordofan state on Wednesday, official radio reported, a day after peace talks with the government broke off.

"SPLM-North shelled Kadugli with Katyusha (rockets)," Radio Omdurman said in a brief SMS dispatch citing the state's governor.

Sudanese investigations into the country's worst urban unrest in two decades have still not been made public, months after the September demonstrations, a U.N. expert said on Wednesday.

Dozens were killed and hundreds detained in the unrest sparked by a rise in fuel prices.

A man from the Central African Republic who stabbed a Russian diplomat and his wife in Khartoum has been jailed for three years, Russia's embassy in Sudan said on Wednesday.

The couple were attacked just outside their Khartoum diplomatic mission on January 28, in a rare example of violence against foreigners in Sudan.

South Sudan's army said Wednesday that it had lost contact with its troops in the key oil hub of Malakal following a major offensive by rebels.

The rebels have said they now control the northeastern town after launching an assault on Tuesday, throwing into doubt a ceasefire agreement signed in Ethiopia last month.

A landmine blast in war-torn South Kordofan last week killed a Red Crescent worker and wounder several others, the United Nations said on Tuesday clarifying earlier accounts.

Ali al-Za'tari, who heads the U.N. mission in Sudan, gave new details about the blast which was first reported on February 12 by Sudan's official Radio Omdurman.

Peace talks between Sudan and South Kordofan rebels adjourned Tuesday until the end of the month, after failing to progress on key issues since negotiations kicked off last week.

"We should adjourn this present session of the negotiations to give the possibility to the parties to have consultations with their principles," said Thabo Mbeki, chief mediator of the African Union-led talks.

More than 20 people were injured, eight of them by gunshots, when Sudanese police allegedly opened fire on demonstrators in Sudan's Darfur region, peacekeepers said Tuesday, raising an earlier toll.

The African Union-U.N. Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) could not confirm that two people died in Monday's incident involving residents of the Hamadiya camp for displaced people just outside Zalingei, the capital of Central Darfur state.

Sudanese police allegedly opened fire Monday on demonstrators from a camp for displaced people in the troubled Darfur region, wounding an unconfirmed number, peacekeepers said.

"The initial unconfirmed report that UNAMID got was that two were injured. However, we are still verifying the report," a public information officer with the African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur told Agence France Presse.