It was Clooney's second visit to the United Nations; in September, he met with the U.N. Security Council, just weeks after the council had pushed through a plan to install 20,000 U.N. peacekeepers in Darfur. Any action, however, would have to await the consent of Khartoum, but Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir gave a strident objection, calling a U.N. force equal to a second colonization of his country.

For his part, Clooney echoed the words of U.S. President George W. Bush, calling the Darfur situation the first genocide of the 21st century and saying the international community had a moral obligation to put a stop to it.

But the violence has persisted -- in some places, accelerated -- in the last months.

More than 200,000 people have died as a result of the Darfur conflict since 2003 and at least two million others displaced from their homes because of fighting among government forces, allied militias and rebel groups seeking greater autonomy. Most of the displaced persons are entirely dependent on direct food aid, according to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

And so Clooney and the rest of the delegation are using star power to keep the world's attention from wandering away.

As Clooney noted at the United Nations Friday, the African Union force that tries to keep the peace in Darfur, is under-funded and under-staffed. Villagers continue to be terrorized, rape is committed at epidemic proportions and the violence is spreading further into neighboring Chad and Central African Republic.

Clooney and like-minded stars are therefore taking the subject directly to those they said have the power to stop it. Accompanied by the actor Don Cheadle, Olympic speed skater Joey Cheek and Kenyan Olympic distance runner Tegla Loroupe, Clooney hoped to reach out to the Arab world and to China, which will carry the mantle of peace as host of the 2008 Olympics. Egypt, they met with the country's foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, and with the son and daughter-in-law of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

In China, which has a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, Clooney urged leaders to demonstrate China's commitment to human rights. China has strong business ties with Sudan, and has blocked strong Security Council action against Sudan.

"We are hoping to just constantly keep the conversation going on humanitarian issues, that's our big goal," Clooney told reporters after meeting with Annan.

Clooney's visit came at the end of a busy week in U.N. efforts to end the violence, which has been compared to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

On Wednesday, the United Nations made an appeal for $1.8 billion dollars to fund humanitarian, recovery and development projects next year in Sudan, an amount representing roughly half of the world organization's budget for aid operations in 2007.

"Like any big investment, it's a high risk and high return -- but we cannot afford not to do it, 2007 could be a decisive year for Sudan if peace spreads to all regions," Deputy Special Representative to the U.N. Secretary-General Sudan Manuel Aranda da Silva said Wednesday.

On Thursday, the International Criminal Court's Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo notified the Security Council he is almost ready to bring cases against individuals he said have committed some of the worst war crimes in Darfur during the past three years. Evidence will be submitted to ICC judges by February, Moreno-Ocampo said.

"The evidence provides reasonable grounds to believe that the individuals identified have committed crimes against humanity and war crimes, including the crimes of persecution, torture, murder and rape, during a period in which the gravest crimes occurred in Darfur," he said.

And following the swearing in ceremony of incoming U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Thursday, Ban said he planned to become "directly engaged" in U.N. efforts in Darfur.

"The suffering of the people of Darfur is simply unacceptable, and despite intensive efforts, the security situation appears to be deteriorating over recent days," he said.

Talk has also begun of a new Security Council resolution, which could put renewed pressure on Sudan, including the creation of a no-fly zone.

It is not yet clear if any of this will make a difference.

"We're at a stalemate," Clooney told reporters Friday. "There's a fire in the theater and someone's got to get up and yell that."

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