Sudan’s ‘worst kept secret’? Women bearing the brunt of violence

     

 

A top Sudanese general has said the United Arab Emirates is sending supplies to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), publicly accusing the UAE of involvement in its war with its powerful paramilitary rival for the first time, Reuters reports:

Army leaders had previously only hinted at interference from unnamed neighboring countries in the seven-month-old war, which has displaced more than 6 million people and triggered waves of ethnically driven killings in Darfur…..The comments come after the RSF has gained momentum in the war, dislodging the army from four states in the Darfur region. The RSF quickly gained control of most of the capital, Khartoum, soon after the start of the war.

“We have information from intelligence, military intelligence, and the diplomatic circuit that the UAE sends planes to support the Janjaweed,” General Yassir al-Atta said in a speech to members of the General Intelligence Service in Omdurman, in a video circulated on social media and viewed by Reuters.

The RSF’s paramilitary forces primarily comprise the Janjaweed militias which committed numerous atrocities on behalf of the Sudanese government during the earlier war in Darfur.

“Now, in a terrible turn of events, Sudanese women are bearing the brunt of the vicious war,” a former President of Liberia and 2011 Nobel Peace laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf observed (above) in The [London] Times and Al Jazeera. She is “troubled by reports that the United Arab Emirates has been supplying arms to the RSF,” Sirleaf writes. “A prominent analyst of the Sudan crisis has described the UAE’s material support for the RSF as ‘the worst kept secret going right now’”.

African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies

Johnson Sirleaf’s highlighting of conflict-related sexual violence echoes a recent report on Sexual Slavery in Khor Jahannam (right) from the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies, a partner of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). 

The outbreak of war in April 2023 led to a wave of refugees and the displacement of nearly three million people, says the report, citing such violations as aerial bombardment of civilians, public and private facilities, enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and rape:

The ongoing war and the history of both warring parties have made these violations disturbingly prominent. Military headquarters of the warring parties in the center of cities have facilitated raids on houses and attacks on civilians. New trends of violations have also emerged, including the abduction of women and girls and forcible transfer to other states, with brutal torture and the potential for developing into sexual slavery and trafficking. Eyewitness testimonies indicate that these violations were committed by individuals wearing RSF’s uniforms.

The report urges RSF commanders to release kidnapped women; calls on the international and regional communities to pressurize both warring parties to release all those arrested; and demands that the parties to the conflict to “facilitate the safe access of the International Red Cross” to all areas mentioned in the report to investigate the possible presence of the abducted women. RTWT

Although the operational terrain for civil society in Sudan is arduous, various groups are working to create an environment for peace, notes Dr. Entisar Abdelsadig, a senior advisor on Sudan at Search for Common Ground. ​Local leaders and organizers are preparing and delivering ready-made meals, medicine, and hygiene kits for internally displaced people (IDPs), and community organizations in Kassala and Gadarif conduct welfare activities performing songs, theater plays, and guidance programs for conflict-affected citizens seeking support, he writes for the Council on Foreign Relations.

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