MADRID (EUROPA PRESS).– The conflict unleashed in Sudan four months ago, which pits the Army against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), has already left more than 4,000 dead and a battery of abuses that, according to the High Commissioner of the UN for Human Rights, Volker Turk, may constitute war crimes.
Among the victims would be “hundreds of civilians”, including 435 children and 28 medical and humanitarian workers. However, the UN assumes that these figures will be much higher, to the extent that there is no protocol for identifying victims and the intensity of the fighting prevents any type of verification.
“Many civilians have died in the Khartoum area for resisting RSF attempts to loot their homes or rape the women of the family,” Turk said as an example of the cruelty of a conflict that has plagued the capital and the region. of Darfur as the main scenarios.
It is a “disastrous” and “senseless” war for power, in the words of Turk, who denounced the destruction of homes, schools and hospitals, as well as the suppression of all kinds of essential services and supplies. Food insecurity already affects more than 20 million people and at least 700,000 children are in a limit situation, while more than 4 million people have been forced to leave their homes.
Displaced persons and refugees are also vulnerable to other types of abuse, especially in the case of women. The High Commissioner already has on his desk “credible” reports on 32 incidents and 73 victims of sexual violence. At least 19 of the cases involve men wearing RSF uniforms.
“I have urged the top authorities in Sudan (…) to give clear instructions to those under their command that there is zero tolerance for sexual violence. Perpetrators must be held to account and this violence must be clearly and unequivocally condemned Turk claimed.
The UN also warned of arbitrary arrests, extrajudicial executions and forced disappearances. In Khartoum alone, at least half a thousand people were missing at the end of July, but like the rest of the statistics it is only an estimate due to the existing chaos.
resume dialog
“The parties to the conflict must immediately cease the fighting, resume political dialogue, comply with their obligations under International Law (…) and allow the uninterrupted delivery of humanitarian aid,” Turk requested, also stressing the need to investigate the abuses perpetrated.
He called on the international community to “increase political and economic pressure” on both sides and to increase support for humanitarian organizations that continue to respond to the crisis, both inside Sudan and in neighboring countries where refugees continue to arrive.
