Sudan: Rapid Support Forces massacres in Darfur “may be genocide,” according to Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch said on Thursday that attacks by Sudanese paramilitary forces in West Darfur against Masalit residents and other non-Arab communities constitute ethnic cleansing and potential genocide.

The Rapid Support Forces and their allied militias are accused of killing thousands of people and displacing hundreds of thousands during their attack on El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state, between April and November 2023.

In its report, Human Rights Watch documented “relentless” attacks by the Rapid Support Forces and allied militias, including the Third Tamazuj Front, against Masalit-majority-inhabited areas in El Geneina from April to June 2023. The human rights organisation said the attackers committed Other serious violations, including torture, rape and looting.

Human Rights Watch said that targeting Masalit and other non-Arab residents to permanently displace them from their area at least amounts to ethnic cleansing. She also said that the atrocities, if committed with the intention of wholly or partially destroying the Masalit, at least in West Darfur, would indicate that genocide had occurred there as well.

In one large-scale massacre on June 15, the report said, the RSF and allied militants opened fire on a convoy of civilians trying to flee the city, accompanied by Masalit fighters.

The Rapid Support Forces and militias pursued, arrested and shot men, women and children who were running in the streets or trying to swim across the fast-flowing Kaga River. Many drowned. Human Rights Watch said that the elderly and wounded were not spared.

The report cited the testimony of a 17-year-old boy describing the killing of 12 children and five adults from several families during the massacre. Two Rapid Support Forces forces… grabbed the children from their parents, and when the parents started screaming, the Rapid Support Forces shot the parents, killing them. 

Then, they gathered the children and shot them. “They threw their bodies into the river with their belongings behind them,” the boy said. A local Masalit leader, who spoke to Middle East Eye from a refugee camp in neighbouring Chad, said the atrocities in West Darfur were more brutal in type and scale than those committed in 2004-2005 in Darfur.

He said: There is massive evidence that what happened was a deliberate genocide based on our colour and race as Masalit. This includes the method of killing, replacing bodies, torture, killing children, verbal attacks, and others. Three senior members of the Rapid Support Forces declined to comment when contacted by Middle East Eye.

Governments, the African Union and the United Nations must act now to protect civilians.

The International Criminal Court is currently investigating the atrocities that occurred in West Darfur. Human Rights Watch called on state parties to support the investigation.

The Masalit leader in Chad, who spoke on condition of anonymity for security reasons, said he was appalled by the “international community’s inaction” regarding violations against his community.

The International Criminal Court must begin procedures to bring the perpetrators to justice and issue an arrest warrant for the leaders of the Rapid Support Forces,” he said.

Sudanese human rights defender Jamal Abdullah Khamis called on activists and journalists to continue documenting violations to shed light on the Darfur issue.

We must see the killers behind bars to begin any steps towards true peace,” he said.

Before the war, Hemedti and Burhan were allies. In 2019, they ousted President Omar al-Bashir from power after mass protests against him, then jointly led a military coup against an interim military-civilian government.

The current conflict has displaced at least 10.7 million people, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council, the second highest number this century after the Syrian war.

There are about 1.7 million of them in neighbouring countries, mainly Chad and Egypt.

 Human Rights Watch said that more than half a million refugees from West Darfur, most of them from El Geneina, have fled to Chad since April. The Raoul Wallingerg Center said in its report issued in April that Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic and Russia, through the actions of the Wagner Group, are “complicit in genocide.

The Middle East Eye website published a report on a network of supply lines transporting weapons and other goods from the United Arab Emirates to the Rapid Support Forces via allied groups and governments in Libya, Chad, and the Central African Republic.