The population of El Fasher, which includes thousands of displaced people, is in ‘dire need of food, medicine and water’
Water, food and fuel supplies for people in the largest city in the Darfur region of Sudan are being choked off as fighting intensifies, according to reports.
El Fasher has been encircled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group over recent weeks, besieging the population as well as the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and allied militias.
Continue reading...While conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine have captured global attention, the civil war in Sudan has been largely ignored. That can’t be allowed to continue, says the Guardian’s Nesrine Malik
With so much of the world’s attention on the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, one of the worst humanitarian crises of recent times is playing out almost unnoticed. Sudan’s civil war erupted in April 2023 and has led to tens of thousands of civilian deaths and a mass displacement of up to half of the country’s population.
As Nesrine Malik tells Helen Pidd, the battle between the Sudanese Army and rebel militia the Rapid Support Forces is finely balanced, with the effect that neither side has enough strength to win the conflict decisively and so no end is in sight.
Continue reading...Satellite data indicates growing number of airstrikes on settlements, in a war that has already killed thousands
The number of villages in Sudan that have been destroyed or severely damaged by fire has risen sharply in recent weeks, suggesting the country’s conflict is intensifying as it enters its second year.
Satellite data revealed the number of Sudanese settlements set on fire in March increased to 30, the highest monthly total recorded since fighting broke out between the country’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) last April.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Rights groups denounce negotiations with Rapid Support Forces, accused of ethnic cleansing and war crimes
Foreign Office officials are holding secret talks with the paramilitary group that has been waging a campaign of ethnic cleansing in Sudan for the past year.
News that the British government and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are engaged in clandestine negotiations has prompted warnings that such talks risk legitimising the notorious militia – which continues to commit multiple war crimes – while undermining Britain’s moral credibility in the region.
Continue reading...People in West Darfur’s capital still step over residue from the bodies of some of the 10,000 dead, and thousands have fled
Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state in Sudan, can feel like two cities in one. There are mass graves, abandoned armoured vehicles and homeless children, but also newly opened restaurants, bustling markets and factory-fresh Toyotas, nicknamed Kenjcanjia – meaning stolen in the local dialect – owing to their lack of registration plates.
Since war broke out between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in April last year, the city has witnessed two major massacres. Decomposing bodies lay out on the streets for up to 10 days on both occasions, their flesh eaten by dogs and chickens. Residues from the bodies of the dead remain even now, stepped over by people as they go about their daily business.
Continue reading...UN humanitarian coordinator for Sudan says war between army and paramilitaries is ‘horrific’
Violence against civilians in Sudan is “verging on pure evil,” a senior UNofficial has warned, as fighting escalates seven months into the war between the army and paramilitaries.
“We keep saying that the situation is horrific and grim. But, frankly, we are running out of words to describe the horror of what is happening in Sudan,” said Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Sudan.
Continue reading...Latest atrocities in Sudan war include the shelling of house of traditional healer, who died with her children and neighbours
People trapped in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, and its twin city of Omdurman say civilians are being deliberately targeted in shelling by the warring parties.
A woman who had been helping wounded soldiers was killed along with her three children and six neighbours when her home was shelled by Sudanese army forces earlier this week.
Continue reading...Africa minister says civilian death toll horrific and UK is to send evidence to UN
War crimes and atrocities against civilians are being committed in Darfur, western Sudan, the UK’s Africa minister Andrew Mitchell said on Tuesday, becoming one of the first western officials to identify that the fighting in Sudan has developed into more than a power struggle between two rival factions.
Mitchell said there was growing evidence of serious atrocities being committed, describing the civilian death toll as horrific in a statement released by the Foreign Office. “Reports of deliberate targeting and mass displacement of the Masalit community in Darfur are particularly shocking and abhorrent. Intentional directing of attacks at the civilian population is a war crime.”
Continue reading...Up to 17,000 more children a day lack food, Save the Children say, as global indifference to humanitarian crisis condemned as ‘racist’
The past four months of fighting in Sudan has pushed millions into food insecurity – with an additional 1.5 million children expected to fall into crisis levels of hunger by September – as aid agencies say they are struggling to reach people.
Up to 17,000 children a day have been falling into crisis levels of hunger, Save the Children warned on Tuesday. With 4 million people displaced so far, the charity said more people were facing hunger in Sudan than at any point since records there began in 2012.
Continue reading...Peace between Hemedti’s RSF and Sudan’s army will not end war crimes. As UN security council president, Britain must act
As conflict in Sudan escalates, it is becoming clear that the Rapid Support Forces has returned to Darfur to complete the genocide it began 20 years ago. The RSF is the Janjaweed rebranded, the “devils on horseback” used by the Sudanese government from 2003 to implement widespread and systematic crimes against non-Arab communities across Darfur. The RSF was, and still is, commanded by Gen Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo.
In recent weeks, what we knew was coming has been confirmed. Yale University’s Conflict Observatory, which uses a combination of satellite imagery, Nasa thermal-detection data and open-source analysis, found evidence of the “targeted destruction of at least 26 communities” by the RSF between 15 April and 10 July. Mass graves have been discovered, and satellite imagery shows entire urban neighbourhoods and villages have been burned down.
Continue reading...Alleged victims of Sudanese paramilitary and allied militia found in shallow grave in West Darfur
At least 87 people including ethnic Masalits have been found buried in a mass grave in Sudan’s West Darfur, the UN human rights office has said, adding that it had credible information that the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) were responsible.
RSF officials denied any involvement, saying the paramilitary group was not a party to the conflict in West Darfur.
Continue reading...Khamis Abdallah Abbakar was murdered hours after criticising Rapid Support Forces on television
Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have been blamed for the assassination and mutilation of a senior government official, amid growing reports of mass killings in the restive Darfur region in the country’s devastating war.
Khamis Abdallah Abbakar, the governor of West Darfur, was murdered this week just hours after he gave an interview to a Saudi-owned TV station in which he criticised the RSF and described a “genocide”.
Continue reading...Unicef says ‘more and more unaccompanied children’ among thousands of refugees streaming across 1,000km-long border
Hundreds of unaccompanied children have crossed the border from Sudan into Chad in recent weeks as fighting separates families and forces minors to make the arduous journey to safety without their parents.
Humanitarian workers say “more and more” children are arriving alone in the neighbouring country, to which more than 100,000 refugees, about 60% of them under-18s, have fled since fighting erupted between rival military factions in mid-April.
Continue reading...Six trucks of humanitarian supplies looted while airstrikes in Khartoum undermine ceasefire
Aid agencies are pleading with battling factions in Sudan to allow humanitarian assistance to reach the needy, after six trucks of humanitarian supplies were looted and airstrikes in Khartoum undermined a new ceasefire.
Martin Griffiths, the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, said on Wednesday he was seeking assurances that would allow for movement of staff and supplies.
Continue reading...UK all-party group says failure to bring to justice Darfur abusers 20 years ago has led to current violence
The UK should impose sanctions on human rights abusers in senior Sudanese military positions as well as designate the Wagner group operating in Sudan as a terrorist group, a report from the all-party group on Sudan has urged.
The group, including the Conservative former Africa minister Vicky Ford, said on Wednesday the west has allowed impunity to become the norm, and the failure to bring to justice many of those responsible for the genocide in Darfur 20 years ago has allowed the same militia to regroup and form part of the forces now blocking democracy in the country.
Continue reading...Sudanese campaigners describe their fears amid escalating clashes between forces loyal to the two generals, as well as their anger over warnings ignored
The Sudanese people will continue to resist military forces that usurped the transition to democratic rule, says the protester who has become known as “the Spiderman of Sudan”.
The young teacher, who became known as “Spidey” for the costume he wore to protests against the military coup in 2021, said a friend had already been killed in heavy fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which erupted on Saturday.
Continue reading...Paramilitary group reports seizing control of presidential palace, army chief’s home and Khartoum airport
• Fighting in Sudan’s capital – latest updates
Sudan was plunged into a long-feared violent crisis on Saturday as a bitter struggle for power appeared to break out between the two main factions of the ruling military regime.
At least 25 people were reported to have been killed in clashes in the vast and strategic east African country during heavy fighting between the Sudanese armed forces and the paramilitaries of the Rapid Support Force (RSF), according to the Sudan Doctor’s Committee, a local NGO.
Continue reading...Reported deaths more than double in a year, with women attacked by male relatives for appearing to talk to men on smartphones
Campaigners are calling for urgent action to tackle what they say is a rise in “honour killings” in Sudan.
Eleven women and girls have reportedly been killed by relatives so far this year, more than double the number reported in 2021. Two women have died in the past month.
Continue reading...Death toll likely to rise, say witnesses to indiscriminate attacks on Kreinik and El Geneina by Sudan’s notorious Rapid Support Forces
At least 200 people are now known to have died in West Darfur in the latest attack on civilians and local forces blamed on Janjaweed militia.
Darfur, the semi-arid western region of Sudan where a vicious civil war erupted in 2003, has seen a new outbreak of fighting over the past few months as rival groups clash over water and grazing land, shortages of which are being exacerbated by the climate crisis.
Continue reading...Fears death toll from Sunday’s clashes could rise after armed tribesmen attacked villages of non-Arab Massalit minority
Clashes between rival groups in Sudan’s Darfur killed at least 168 people on Sunday, an aid group has said, in the latest bout of deadly violence to hit the restive region.
Darfur, which was ravaged by civil war that erupted in 2003, has seen a spike in deadly conflict since October last year triggered by disputes mainly over land, livestock and access to water and grazing.
Continue reading...