There was a glimmer of hope recently in the darkness of the civil war in Sudan, with a peace proposal from the government. However, it is also seen as unlikely that the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) would accept the terms, while more revelations of massacres by the RSF underlined the need for an end to the war.
Ceasefire proposal
It was reported on 23 December that Kamil Idris, Sudan’s prime minister had the previous day proposed a wide-ranging peace initiative to end the nearly 1,000-day civil war between government forces and a rival paramilitary force, while the United States were said to have “urged both sides to accept the Trump administration’s call for an immediate humanitarian truce”.
The Security Council was informed of the plan put forward by Idris, who heads Sudan’s transitional civilian government, which calls for a ceasefire monitored by the African Union, Arab league and the United Nations, and “the withdrawal of paramilitary forces from all areas they occupy, their placement in supervised camps and their disarmament”.
However it was also noted that the prime minister’s proposal, would essentially give government forces a victory and take away the military power of the RSF and was therefore unlikely to be supported by them.
1,000 civilians killed in three days
The need for a ceasefire and an end to the terrible violence in Sudan was underlined again by a report on 19 December which stated that a UN report published on 18 December claimed that the RSF militia, which has been fighting against government troops in Sudan for two and a half years, had murdered over 1,000 civilians during a three-day offensive in April.
The report from the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said that it “documented the killing of at least 1,013 civilians in the context of the RSF offensive on Zamzam IDP camp” between April 11 and 13.
The OHCHR said that during the three-day offensive more than 400,000 residents of the camp had also been displaced.
The RSF destroyed the Zamzam refugee camp near El Fasher in an attack in April, while it was laying deadly siege to the city of El Fasher. At that time, several hundred thousand people were said to be living in what was the largest refugee camp in North Darfur.
It was further noted that, “The brutal power struggle that emerged has created what the UN describes as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. According to UN figures, fighting has displaced around 12 million people in the country, while every second resident is threatened by hunger”.
A camp full of terrified people
The report by the UN into the attacks in April at Zamzam refugee camp for displaced people, described how civilians, including a large number who had managed to escape from the besieged city of El Fasher, had abductions and torture during the three-day attack by RSF in April this year.
UN rights chief Volker Türk noted that 319 people had faced summary execution in the schools, health facilities, the main market, at home, and mosques, while altogether over 1,000 civilians had been killed in the Zamzam offensive.
Türk commented: “Such deliberate killing of civilians or persons or de combat may constitute the war crime of murder… The world must not sit back. and watch as such cruelty becomes entrenched.
“At least 104 people, including 75 women, 26 girls and three boys, most of them from the Zaghawa ethnic tribe were subjected to gruesome sexual violence, including rape and gang rape and sexual slavery.”
The Emergency Response Rooms network
The deadly civil war in Sudan has prompted the development of at least one grassroots network aimed at protecting people and saving lives. It was reported on 24 December that a huge grassroots network of ordinary Sudanese people, the Emergency Response Rooms (ERRs), had developed across Sudan and is “providing life-saving food and medical care to millions of fellow citizens”.
It is dangerous work, as anybody getting involved in in the mutual aid network, can “become an immediate target for both the RSF and the country’s military, believed to have killed up to 400,000 people between them since the war erupted in April 2023.” Consequently, very few of the thousands of volunteers have told family or friends of their work with the ERRs for fear that they, too, became targets by association.
One of those involved in the network commented: “I’d never tell anybody, especially my mother, where I was going. You have to sneak in and hope you make it back.”
Comment
The news of a ceasefire proposal is welcome but has to be seen in the context of a civil war that is one of the most brutal and deadly that the world has seen in many years. The latest revelations of violence by the RSF only underline just how desperately some resolution to the conflict is needed.
We can only hope that the new year will see more attention paid to the situation in Sudan by the world community and a more concerted push for a ceasefire and permanent end to the violence, whilst those responsible for the worst of the violence mut face justice.
In the meantime we should all try and support the people of Sudan and those like the Emergency Rooms Network, who are trying so valiantly to uphold human decency there.
What can you do?
You can sign a petition asking the UK government to stop selling arms to the UAE here.
To find other ways you can help the people of Sudan please see:
Red Cross Sudan appeal here.
United Nations Refugee Agency for Sudan appeal here.
