MORE than 2,000 civilians were brutally slaughtered at the hands of rogue paramilitary forces in just 48 hours in Sudan, the country’s army has said.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has been at war with the army for over two years, is accused of mass killing unarmed civilians in the city of El-Fasher.
El-Fasher fell to RSF after more than 18 months of brutal siege warfare, giving the group control over every state capital in the vast Darfur region.
Joint Forces, a military group fighting alongside the army, said today that the RSF “committed heinous crimes against innocent civilians in the city of El-Fasher”.
It said that more than 2,000 unarmed citizens were “executed and killed” on October 26 and 27, and most of them were “women, children and the elderly”.
Verified footage shows a fighter known for executing civilians in RSF-controlled areas shooting a group of unarmed civilians sitting on the ground at point-blank range.
Various human rights groups have voiced their concerns over what they say is a “systematic and intentional process” of ethnic cleansing of Fur, Zaghawa, and Berti indigenous non-Arab communities through forced displacement and summary execution.
This includes what appears to be “door-to-door clearance operations” in the city.
Local groups and international NGOs had warned that El-Fasher’s fall could trigger mass atrocities against the innocent people.
The EU today said it was “deeply concerned” by intensified violence in El-Fasher and urged “all warring parties to de-escalate”.
“We are closely monitoring the situation with our partners and ensuring that all violations of international humanitarian and human rights law are documented,” foreign affairs spokesman Anouar El Anouni said. “There can be no impunity.”
The paramilitaries have a track record of atrocities, having killed as many as 15,000 civilians from non-Arab groups in the West Darfur capital of El-Geneina.
UN rights chief Volker Turk spoke of a growing risk of “ethnically motivated violations and atrocities” in El-Fasher.
His office said it was “receiving multiple, alarming reports that the Rapid Support Forces are carrying out atrocities, including summary executions”.
The Sudanese army, which has been fighting the RSF since April 2023, has also been accused of war crimes.
More than a year and a half of siege warfare made El-Fasher one of the grimmest places in a war that the UN has labelled among the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
After three years of intense fighting, the war has spiralled into what the UN describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis.
Displacement camps outside the city were officially declared to be in famine, while inside it, people turned to animal fodder for food.
The UN warned before the city’s fall that 260,000 people remained trapped there without aid, half of them children.
Civil war
General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the Sudanese army chief, said on Monday that his forces had withdrawn from El-Fasher “to a safer location”.
He pledged to fight “until this land is purified”.
But analysts said that Sudan was now effectively partitioned along an east-west axis, with the RSF having already set up a parallel government.
The capture of El-Fasher could mark a significant turning point in Sudan’s war, which has killed tens of thousands and displaced nearly 12 million people since April 2023.
The city’s capture gives the RSF control over all five state capitals in Darfur, consolidating its parallel administration in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur.
The army is now confined to the north, east and centre of Sudan and is excluded from a third of Sudanese territory.
FOOTBALLER GONE
Football League star tragically dies aged just 42 after cancer battle
CHA-CHA-CHAOS
Strictly’s Amber Davies breaks silence after pro Nikita pictured kissing her
This is breaking news… please refresh for more updates…