Nadia on... Sudan

In 2019, the streets of Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, were filled with hope as a popular revolution succeeded in ousting Omar al-Bashir, a brutal military dictator who had ruled for thirty years. An acute economic crisis the year before had worsened living conditions and caused food prices to soar, pushing the population to demand democracy and a change in leadership. The revolution had two demands: first, the removal of the dictator, and second, the ejection of the military from power once and for all.

 Though al-Bashir had spent the previous three decades ensuring that a military coup would not oust him from power (as was the case for many of his predecessors), his two military allies – Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo – ultimately turned against him, using the popular revolution as a way to seize power. 

 Al-Burhan, leader of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), and Dagalo, in charge of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), assured protesters that democracy would follow after a two-year transition period to prepare for civilian rule. However, Al-Burhan was then named as head of the transitional military council, and Dagalo, the deputy head. In simple terms, the two consistently evaded any real transition to a civilian-led government, then turned on the civilians, and then against one another, which ultimately resulted in a violent war that has engulfed the country since April 2023.

 Since then, more than 150,000 people have been killed in Sudan, and up to fourteen million have been displaced both inside and outside of the country. It’s a conflict that the UN has described as the ‘world’s largest humanitarian crisis’ and has also resulted in famine, widespread sexual violence against women and girls, and acts of genocide. With no end to the war in sight, it is clear that governments around the world, including our own, are not doing enough to end this crisis.

 The SAF and the RSF have committed war crimes. A report to the UN Human Rights Council found that both groups have been responsible for direct and large-scale attacks against civilians and the extensive destruction of essential infrastructure for survival, including medical centres, markets, food and water systems, and displacement camps. 

However, the RSF has also targeted non-Arab ethnic groups, killing them indiscriminately. In October, RSF fighters overran the SAF’s last major stronghold in Darfur, El Fasher, and have been accused of raping women and girls, mutilating and killing 2000 unarmed civilians with impunity. Reportedly, the RSF moved house to house and carried out widespread executions, and also killed 500 patients and their companions in a maternity hospital. The killing spree has been so severe that blood saturating the ground has been picked up by satellite imagery. Many of these atrocities have also been captured on video. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is investigating whether the paramilitary force had committed ‘war crimes and crimes against humanity’. The RSF has been accused of attempting to conceal evidence of these mass killings in Darfur by burning bodies or burying them in mass graves. 

 Historically, Darfur, a region in western Sudan, has been the site of atrocities committed against the indigenous ethnic groups in the area. In the early 2000s, government-backed militias known as the Janjaweed carried out systematic attacks against non-Arab ethnic groups, leading the United Nations to describe these actions as acts of genocide. The UN estimates that between 2003 and 2008, up to 300,000 people were killed. Over time, the Janjaweed were folded into the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), and the recent attacks against ethnic groups in Darfur are viewed as a continuation of these atrocities.

 The situation is dire and deteriorating rapidly. The UN’s humanitarian response plan for Sudan remains chronically underfunded, and cuts by the Trump administration have severely weakened international aid. According to the UN, thirty million people now require humanitarian assistance, with 21 million facing severe acute food insecurity. For the second consecutive year, Sudan has topped the International Rescue Committee’s list of countries at highest risk of new or worsening humanitarian crises. So what can our government do?

 Foreign arms deliveries have enabled the RSF to become one of the most heavily armed irregular forces in Africa. Evidence indicates that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has supplied a steady flow of weapons to the RSF. A report by UN experts, leaked earlier this year, documented transport flights from the UAE to Chad that deliberately sought to evade detection, while munitions with serial numbers linked to the UAE have also been recovered. In light of this evidence, our government must halt all arms sales to the UAE.

 There are also reports that the UK government rejected atrocity-prevention plans for Sudan last autumn, opting for the ‘least ambitious’ of four proposed measures despite intelligence warnings of the risk of ethnic cleansing and genocide. Our leaders must urgently revisit this decision and scale up actions to prevent atrocities.

 Finally, the government must set out what additional steps it will now take in response to the UN’s warning that the situation is ‘spiralling out of control’, and significantly increase the humanitarian aid it provides. 

 The international community must act now, before even more lives are senselessly taken. I will continue pressing the government to respond with the urgency this crisis demands.

nadiawhittome.org