Human Rights Watch Urges UN Action as Sudan Violence Escalates
Human Rights Watch (HRW) is calling on the United Nations to deploy peacekeepers across Sudan as violence escalates in multiple regions, including in Al Jazirah, where attacks have killed hundreds of people since Oct. 20, according to local groups and aid organizations.
The group’s announcement Monday called on the UK, as the new temporary chair of the UN Security Council, to push for a force deployment resolution after rebel forces wreaked havoc upon civilians in and around the province, which is located just outside the capital of Khartoum.
The violence follows the defection of a Rapid Support Forces (RSF) commander to Sudan’s army, sparking retaliatory raids on the province, where he is from.
This holiday season, give to:
Truth and understanding
The Media Line's intrepid correspondents are in Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and Pakistan providing first-person reporting.
They all said they cover it.
We see it.
We report with just one agenda: the truth.
Laetitia Bader, HRW’s deputy Africa director, reported that sexual violence is a defining feature of the RSF’s operations throughout the conflict, and especially now in Al Jazirah state. “Sudanese women’s rights groups have documented cases of sexual violence in more than 30 towns and villages, triggering massive displacement.”
She told the France24 news station that the RSF is targeting women and girls for “widespread rape and gang rape, in particular” because of their ethnicity.
In the 18-month conflict, both the RSF and the government-backed Sudanese military have faced accusations of human rights abuses, but the paramilitary RSF and allied Arab militias are facing accusations of heinous war crimes and crimes against humanity ranging from widespread sexual violence to ethnic cleansing.
The RSF has continually denied these allegations.
