May 7, 2004
'Crimes Against Humanity' in Sudan, Charge UN, Rights Group
OneWorld US

Sudan's government is guilty of "ethnic cleansing" and crimes against humanity, charges a new report released Friday by Human Rights Watch that accuses government-backed Arab militias of systematic attacks on black Sudanese peasants and government forces of starving black Sudanese to death in concentration camps.

Jim Lobe, OneWorld US

WASHINGTON, D.C., May 7 (OneWorld) - Sudan's government is guilty of "ethnic cleansing" and crimes against humanity, charges a new report released Friday by Human Rights Watch that accuses government-backed Arab militias of systematic attacks on black Sudanese peasants and government forces of starving black Sudanese to death in concentration camps.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) called on the UN Security Council to adopt a resolution to permit the safe return of more than one million people forced from their homes in the Darfur region of the country and to demand that Khartoum immediately disarm, disband, and withdraw the Arab militias with which government forces have carried out ethnic cleansing.

HRW's 77-page report, 'Darfur Destroyed,' comes as the Security Council is scheduled to hear a briefing on the situation in Darfur, which some observers have compared to the genocide in Rwanda ten years ago. It also comes amid reports of a new UN report that accuses the government and the militias, known as the 'Janjaweed,' (men on horseback) of systematically starving refugees under their control.

"There can be no doubt about the Sudanese government's culpability in crimes against humanity in Darfur," said Peter Takirambudde, who heads HRW's Africa division. "The UN Security Council must not ignore the brutal facts."

The UN report, which is based on an inter-agency team's recent visit to the Kailek concentration camp in South Darfur, said the team's participants were "visibly shaken" by the conditions in which they found residents. Based on testimonies it obtained at the site, the team found evidence of "a strategy of systematic and deliberate starvation being enforced by the (Government of Sudan) and its security forces on the ground."

Human rights and relief groups have been warning for months that the situation in Darfur was becoming catastrophic for those who fled their homes due to militia violence directed mainly against members of the Fur, Masalit, and Zaghawa ethnic groups, which make up the majority of the region's inhabitants.

The three groups are all Muslim, but, unlike the Janjaweed, who are Arab, they are also black Africans like their mainly Christian and animist cousins in southern Sudan, who have been fighting for independence from Khartoum since 1983. While the Janjaweed are nomads, the Africans are mainly peasants who live in small villages and towns.

The violence began in early 2003 when two African rebel groups in Darfur, the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), launched attacks against government military installations to protest Janjaweed raids against their communities, as well as Khartoum's neglect of the region.

The reaction was swift, as the government enhanced its support for the Janjaweed and launched a "scorched-earth" campaign, including aerial bombing, against African settlements and refugees. Since the onset of hostilities more than 120,000 people have sought refuge in neighboring Chad, while hundreds of thousands are internally displaced within Darfur.

Under international pressure, Khartoum announced a cease-fire last month, but aid groups and others insist that the violence continues in many parts of the region.

The HRW report--based on a 25-day mission in and near West Darfur, whose traditional residents are mainly Masalit and Fur farmers--found that since August 2003, wide swathes of the area, among the most fertile in the region, have been burned and depopulated.

With rare exceptions, according to the report, the countryside has been emptied of its original inhabitants, and everything that can sustain life--including livestock, food stores, wells and pumps, blankets and clothing--has been looted or destroyed.

Mosques have been destroyed, Muslim religious leaders killed, and Korans have been desecrated by the Janjaweed, according to the report.

"Villages have been torched not randomly, but systematically--often not once, but twice," according to the report, which said that most of the civilians were driven into camps and settlements outside the larger towns, "where the Janjaweed kill, rape, and pillage--even stealing emergency relief items--with impunity."

The report, which also includes testimony from victims, found that the Janjaweed almost always outnumber regular soldiers during attacks, but that government forces "usually arrive first and leave last." Often Janjaweed members wear uniforms that are virtually indistinguishable from those of the army.

Despite international calls for investigations of the situation, the government has responded by restricting access to the region by both international media and relief groups. As international pressure on the government has grown, access has increased, but HRW said it has received reports that the government is tampering with mass graves and other evidence of "the immensity of its crimes," which it is now attempting to cover up.

With the rainy season starting later this month, access will become far more difficult. In addition, the inability of farmers to plant their crops in time, could mean widespread starvation.

The UN team, which included technical staff from UNICEF (news - web sites), the World Health Organization (news - web sites), Food and Agricultural Organization, and Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, reported that they had received accounts from survivors of "acts of mass murder" that recalled "the brutalities of the Rwanda genocide."

It described the situation in which the displaced are living in Kailek as "imprisonment," and added that eight or nine children under five were dying of malnutrition every day, describing the government's local policy as one of "forced starvation."

"The team members, all of whom are experienced experts in humanitarian affairs, were visibly shaken by the humanitarian state and conditions in which we found the caseload of (internationally displaced persons, or IDPs) in Kailek." The report said that government security forces were under orders to prevent IDPs from leaving the town.

The team noted that evidenve suggests that the situation in Kailek is not unique.

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