This week, United Nations (UN) chief António Guterres said Sudan is “living through a nightmare of violence”.
A paramilitary group has been accused of killing at least 124 civilians in Sudan, including 10 children.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has been at war with the Northeast African country’s military for 18 months. It’s led to widespread hunger and the displacement of 11 million people.
Local and international media outlets have reported the RSF attacked civilians in the eastern state of Al-Jazirah last week, including sexual attacks on women and girls.
Background
The RSF started out as an unofficial militia group. Then, former President Omar al-Bashir, a dictator who ruled for 30 years, granted it official status.
Both the RSF and al-Bashir face charges of genocide over a conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region in the early 2000s.
In April 2019, the Sudanese army (SAF) and the RSF worked together. They forcibly removed al-Bashir from power, amid mass protests against his rule.
An interim civilian-led Sudanese Government was formed, tasked with coordinating elections by 2022.
However, in 2021, the military took control, with SAF leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan becoming the effective President. RSF leader Muhammad Hamdan Dagalo became his deputy.
In April 2023, the partnership fell apart, resulting in a civil war between the RSF and SAF.
Sudan has since faced violent attacks, with an estimated death toll of 150,000 people.
Al-Jazirah
This week, the UN said the RSF has carried out “major” recent attacks on civilians in eastern areas of the Al-Jazirah state, killing at least 124 people.
The military group has been accused of “rampant sexual violence” against women and girls. The UN said the RSF has burned farms and stolen from businesses and homes.
UN Sudan Humanitarian Coordinator Clementine Nkweta-Salami called the attacks “atrocious crimes… prohibited by International Humanitarian Law.”
United Nations
UN Chief António Guterres drew attention to the conflict while speaking to the Security Council this week, saying that “almost 25 million people [are] now in need of humanitarian assistance.”
The UN Chief described the conflict in Sudan as living in a “nightmare” of hunger, disease, displacement, “collapsed infrastructure,” and “mass ethnic violence”.
“Ethnic cleansing”
In May, the Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused the RSF of killing thousands of people from the Massalit ethnic group in Western Sudan.
Over 500,000 people have fled from West Sudan to the neighbouring nation of Chad.
The HRW accused the RSF of “ethnic cleansing,” which the UN has defined as “a purposeful policy” to push an ethnic group out of an area “by violent and terror-inspiring means”.