UN warns Sudan’s Kordofan faces mass atrocities as fighting spreads

As fierce fighting between rival armed forces threatens a humanitarian catastrophe, the UN has warned that Sudan’s Kordofan region could experience another wave of widespread atrocities.

After last month’s fall of el-Fasher, Sudan’s capital, where international community warnings of impending violence were largely ignored before widespread killings occurred, UN human rights chief Volker Turk said on Thursday that history was “repeating itself” in Kordofan.

According to Turk, it is truly shocking to see history repeat itself in Kordofan so soon after the horrific events in El-Fasher, and he urged other countries to stop the area from experiencing the same fate.

At least 269 civilian deaths have been documented by the UN as a result of aerial bombardment, artillery fire, and summary killings since late October when Bara was taken by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in North Kordofan state.

The actual cost of the incident is probably much higher because of regional communication blackouts, which have led to reports of revenge attacks, arbitrary detentions, sexual violence, and child forced recruitment.

This week, the RSF took control of Babnusa, West Kordofan, with footage showing its fighters circling the military complex. The city’s fall was not claimed by the army.

The Sudan Doctors Network called on the international community to put pressure on the RSF to allow civilians to leave, and said it was “closely monitoring, with concern, developments in Babnusa.”

The area’s hospitals have been overrun, with West Kordofan’s Al-Nuhud Hospital now shut down for good.

Since the start of the conflict, according to the World Health Organization, nearly 1,700 health professionals and patients have died in Sudan.

Important cities like Kadugli and Dilling are now under siege, with Dilling and Kadugli both experiencing looming famine. All conflicting parties are preventing humanitarian aid.

As the violence has spread throughout the vast central region, more than 45, 000 people have recently fled their homes in Kordofan.

According to Turk, “we cannot stand in for another man-made catastrophe,” and demand that armed organizations provide life-saving aid to those in need.

Sudanese Armed Forces and the RSF, a powerful paramilitary group, engaged in an intense fighting in April 2023. Nearly 12 million people have been displaced and tens of thousands have been killed since the war started.

Attention has turned to Kordofan in central Sudan now that it is the last major city under the army’s and its allies’ control since the fall of el-Fasher.

Due to its strategic significance, both sides are in a crucial position in Kordofan. The region serves as a crucial corridor that links the conflicting factions’ heartlands, serving as a vital link between government-held territory in the west and government-controlled Darfur in the west.

The RSF would have a direct route to Khartoum, which government forces recaptured earlier this year, if they had the support of major cities like El Obeid.

The UN issued urgent warnings about potential atrocities before El-Fasher fell in November. Those warnings were largely ignored.

Mass murders broke out after the city’s capture, with corpses emerging from satellite imagery, which prompted UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to refer to it as a “crime scene.”

Since then, Amnesty International has called for the arrest of Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti, the brother of the organization’s leader, and RSF deputy Abdelrahim Dagalo, to face sanctions from the European Union.

Turk urged allies to stop the flow of arms and demand an immediate ceasefire from those who have influence over the conflicting parties.