More than 2 million people have been displaced by the fighting in Sudan, the UN reported on Wednesday, as a UN official warned that intensifying attacks in Darfur City may constitute “crimes against humanity.”
Since the middle of April, when months-long tensions between the military and its competitor, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, erupted into open warfare in Khartoum, the capital, and other parts of the northeastern African country, Sudan has descended into turmoil.
Parts of the capital city and the western province of Darfur, which have both suffered some of the fiercest battles, saw continuous fighting on Wednesday. The Sudanese Doctors Syndicate, which keeps tabs on civilian casualties, reports that as of June 12, at least 959 civilians have been killed and about 4,750 others have been injured.
More than 2 million people have been displaced by the fighting in Sudan, the UN reported on Wednesday, as a UN official warned that intensifying attacks in Darfur City may constitute “crimes against humanity.”
Since the middle of April, when months-long tensions between the military and its competitor, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, erupted into open warfare in Khartoum, the capital, and other parts of the northeastern African country, Sudan has descended into turmoil.
Parts of the capital city and the western province of Darfur, which have both suffered some of the fiercest battles, saw continuous fighting on Wednesday. The Sudanese Doctors Syndicate, which keeps tabs on civilian casualties, reports that as of June 12, at least 959 civilians have been deceased and about 4,750 others have been injured.
Numerous women were sexually assaulted both inside and outside of homes in Genena, according to activists and locals. The RSF was accused of being responsible for almost all rape cases even though it was repeatedly contacted for comment.
West Darfur’s provincial governor, Khamis Abdalla Abkar, charged the RSF and affiliated militias with attacking local communities all around Genena. He pleaded for international action to save civilians in his area in a phone interview with Saudi-owned television station Al-Hadath on Wednesday.
The battle in Genena, according to Volker Perthes, the U.N. representative in Sudan, had “an ethnic dimension,” with Arab militias and armed individuals wearing RSF uniforms displaying “an emerging pattern of large-scale targeted attacks against civilians based on their ethnic identities.”
The United Nations’ special adviser on the prevention of genocide, Alice Wairimu Nderitu, also denounced “the shocking violence” in Genena. In a statement on Tuesday, she expressed concern that such violence would result in “renewed campaigns of rape, murder, and ethnic cleansing amounting to atrocity crimes.”
