UN Rights Office Aides Describe Abuses, Including Sexual Violence, in New Sudan Report

UN Human Rights’ representatives outlined a new Sudan report Friday showing the systematic violations and abuses – often ethnically motivate...

UN Human Rights’ representatives outlined a new Sudan report Friday showing the systematic violations and abuses – often ethnically motivated – including summary executions, targeting of health workers, abductions, and rife and targeted sexual violence against women and girls in the East African country.

Jeremy Laurence, spokesperson for the Human Rights Office, said at a UN press conference, “Our report finds that the conflict-driven crisis has intensified, pointing to a rise in civilian killings, including summary executions, amid growing ethnic violence and a worsening humanitarian situation.”

The Sudan conflict, which began on April 15, 2023, is a civil war between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and shows no signs of abating.

Li Fung, the Sudan representative of the Office of the High Commission for Human Rights, said that the UN Report on Sudan released on Friday (September 19)  finds that the conflict-driven crisis in the country has intensified, pointing to a rise in civilian killings.

“We continue to receive reports of civilians being killed, abducted, or subjected to sexual violence while attempting to leave El Fasher (the capital city of North Darfur).

“There are no safe exit routes out of the city, and civilians are trapped in a situation of impossible choices: stay in El Fasher, and risk bombardment, starvation, and atrocities if the RSF overrun the city; or flee, and face the risk of summary execution, sexual violence, and abduction.”

Fung said that one survivor described her escape from Zamzam camp, some 15 kilometres (9.3 miles) from the city of El Fasher.

Quoting the survivor, Fung told journalists, “I realized that RSF soldiers were everywhere on the road to Tawila, and that I was going to be raped no matter what.”

-       Deaths documented

Laurence noted that between January 1 and June 30, UN Human Rights documented the deaths of at least 3,384 civilians in the context of the conflict, mainly in Darfur, followed by Kordofan and Khartoum.

The deaths represent nearly 80 percent of all civilian casualties (4,238) documented during the whole of 2024.

“The real toll of casualties is likely to be significantly higher,” said Laurence.

He noted that seventy percent of casualties (2,398) occurred during the conduct of hostilities, as the parties continued to launch attacks in densely populated areas, using artillery shelling, airstrikes, and drones.

“Several major offensives and mass casualty incidents were particularly deadly,” said the rights office spokesperson.

“In April, an offensive by the Rapid Support Forces on El Fasher and other areas in North Darfur resulted in at least 527 deaths, including over 270 in Zamzam and Abu Shouk camps for displaced people.”

Then, in March, airstrikes by the Sudanese Armed Forces on Tora market in North Darfur killed at least 350 civilians, including 13 members of one family,” he said.

The report also documents the unlawful killing of at least 990 civilians outside the conduct of hostilities, including through summary executions.

Between February and April, the number of such killings tripled, due in large part to a surge in summary executions, primarily in Khartoum, after SAF and allied fighters recaptured territory previously controlled by the RSF in late March, and campaigns of apparent reprisals against alleged “collaborators” ensued.

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