Paramilitary forces from Sudan have carried out ethnic cleansing in Darfur, the rights group says

CAIRO – A leading rights group said Thursday that attacks by Sudanese paramilitary forces and their allied militias that killed thousands in the western region of Darfur last year constituted a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the area’s non-Arab population.

The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which have been fighting the Sudanese army for more than a year, have allied with armed militias to carry out attacks on the ethnic Masalit and other non-Arab groups in El Geneina, the capital of western state -Darfur, Human Rights Watch says a new report.

Sudan has been rocked by violence since mid-April 2023, when tensions between the army and rival paramilitaries erupted into open fighting. The clashes quickly spread to other parts of the country and Darfur was engulfed in brutal attacks on African civilians, especially the Masalit tribe.

According to the New York-based watchdog, paramilitary forces and their allied militia members mainly targeted Masalit neighborhoods in El Geneina from April to June 2023, with attacks also intensifying in November last year.

At least thousands of people were killed and hundreds of thousands were displaced in the attacks, according to the report titled “The Massalit Will Not Come Home: Ethnic Cleansing and Crimes against Humanity in El Geneina, West Darfur, Sudan.”

Masalit who were captured were tortured, women and girls were raped and entire neighborhoods were looted and destroyed, the report said. HRW said it has interviewed more than 220 people who fled Darfur to neighboring countries and analyzed photos, videos and satellite images linked to the attacks.

United Nations experts estimate that at least 10,000 people will have been killed in the city of El Geneina by 2023. More than 570,000 people, mostly Masalit, were displaced and sought refuge in neighboring Chad.

Human Rights Watch said the campaign of attacks on the non-Arab people in Darfur, including the Masalit, with the “apparent aim” of expelling them “constitutes ethnic cleansing.”

“Governments, the African Union and the United Nations must act now to protect civilians,” HRW Executive Director Tirana Hassan said on Thursday.

“The global inaction in the face of atrocities of this magnitude is inexcusable,” Hassan said. “The government must ensure that those responsible are held accountable.”

The group called on the United Nations, the African Union and states of the International Criminal Court to investigate whether the atrocities documented in the report reveal a specific intention by the RSF’s paramilitary and armed allies to “commit genocide” by Destroy Masalit and other unarmed allies. Arab groups in West Darfur.

The Rapid Support Forces media office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.

In late January, International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan said there are reasons to believe that both the RSF and the Sudanese military may be committing war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide in Darfur.

Twenty years ago, Darfur became synonymous with genocide and war crimes, especially by the infamous Arab Janjaweed militias, against populations who identify as Central or East African.

The Rapid Support Forces were formed from Janjaweed fighters by former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who ruled the country for 30 years before being overthrown in a popular uprising in 2019. He is wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of genocide and other crimes. during the Darfur conflict in the 2000s.

This is a location map for Sudan with its capital Khartoum. (AP)