Sudan – Human rights activists and locals said that dozens of civilians were killed in locations across Sudan over the past week, as the army escalated its air strikes in its nearly 18-month-long war on the Rapid Support Forces.
Although the Rapid Support Forces control about half of Sudan, the army has recently used its air power to help it regain control of some areas of the capital, Khartoum, as well as other areas controlled by the Rapid Support Forces.
The Sudanese human rights group “Emergency Lawyers” said that hundreds were killed in similar attacks across the country. It did not clarify the time period for that death toll, but said it showed “the armed forces’ indifference to protecting defenseless civilians,” it said.
The group added that the aerial bombardment on Al-Hasahisa resulted in the death or injury of about 100 on Monday. Al-Hasahisa is a town in Al-Jazeera State, located south of Khartoum, where many Rapid Support Forces fighters are deployed.
An activist from the area said that at least 38 people were killed, most of them children.
The “Emergency Lawyers” group added that an air strike on October 5 on the town of Hamrat al-Sheikh in North Kordofan State, west of Khartoum, resulted in the death of 30 people and the injury of more than 100 others.
The local emergency response room reported that an air strike targeted another market the day before in the Al-Koma area in North Darfur state, killing 61 people. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said that the dead included 13 children.
On the other hand, the Rapid Support Forces are accused of raiding villages and neighborhoods and committing arbitrary killings and sexual violence in areas under their control.
In turn, the Sudan Liberation Movement said, in a statement today, that the Rapid Support Forces raided 17 villages in North Darfur state and set them on fire, killing or wounding hundreds.
The movement accused the Rapid Support Forces of committing the crime of ethnic cleansing on a scale equal to the violence it was accused of committing in West Darfur state last year.
For its part, the Humanitarian Research Laboratory at Yale University, which monitors the war in Sudan, said that the army also carried out a major bombing campaign in the areas controlled by the Rapid Support Forces in Al-Fasher, located in North Darfur state, which has been besieged by the Rapid Support Forces for months.
Since mid-April 2023, the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces have been waging a war that has left more than 20,000 dead and about 10 million displaced and refugees, according to the United Nations.
UN and international calls are escalating to end the war in order to spare Sudan a humanitarian catastrophe that has begun to push millions into famine and death due to food shortages due to the fighting that has spread to 13 out of 18 states.
Source: Reuters
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