CAIRO, June 10 (Reuters) - A senior Sudanese envoy has denied accusations from human rights groups that his government supports Arab militias who have waged a campaign of looting, burning and rape in the remote western Darfur region.

Claims by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and a number of U.N. officials that the government backs Arab militias known as Janjaweed are untrue, said Hassan Abdin, Sudan's envoy to Britain, in remarks released on Thursday.

He was speaking on BBC World's HARDtalk programme.

The U.N. has called the situation in Darfur the worst humanitarian crisis in the world and estimates one million people have been displaced in the fighting, with more than 158,000 refugees in Chad.

"As far as the government is concerned the Janjaweed are bandits. The government is not responsible for their actions. They don't condone these actions and actually have been trying to restrain the...groups, especially on the border area with Chad.

"Nobody has produced evidence to support these claims that the government is actually arming and supporting and condoning these (Janjaweed)," he said.

"As a matter of fact the targeting of civilians was started by these armed groups, these so-called rebel groups," he said, referring to two main rebel groups who took up arms against Khartoum last year, accusing it of neglecting the poor region.

Human rights groups say they interviewed hundreds of the refugees on the Chad border, who said government bombing raids in Darfur were coordinated with Janjaweed attacks, but Abdin dismissed these claims.

"This was mostly hearsay I am afraid to say. They interviewed the people outside (Darfur). They never interviewed the people inside," he told the BBC.

In a bid to ease the humanitarian crisis caused by the fighting, the United Nations refugee agency UNHCR said on Thursday it was sending more than 1,700 tonnes of aid including blankets, jerry cans, plastic sheeting and tents to Chad.

It said the emergency supplies are expected to last 150,000 refugees through the rainy season when aid delivery will become almost impossible because of poor roads and flooding.