Sudan sexual violence ‘staggering,’ says UN

Demonstrators take part in a protest outside Downing Street to draw attention to the civil war in Sudan as the conflict between Sudan’s army and a paramilitary group has been ongoing for over a year in London, United Kingdom on May 11, 2024. [Wiktor Szymanowicz – Anadolu Agency]

Rape has become “rampant” in Sudan during 18 months of civil war, according to a UN investigation published on Tuesday. Most documented rapes in the country in that period have been committed by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, it added.

The head of the independent international fact-finding mission on the situation in Sudan, retired chief justice Mohamed Chande Othman, said that the sheer scale of sexual violence that the UN investigation has documented in Sudan is “staggering”.

Children have not been spared from this violence. According to the report, women and girls are being abducted for sexual slavery. “There is no safe place in Sudan now,” said Othman.

He heads the mission established late last year by the Human Rights Council to document human rights violations committed in the country since the civil war began in April 2023. That is when fighting broke out between the Sudanese Army led by Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, who is also the head of the Sovereignty Council and the country’s de facto ruler, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, led by his former ally and deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.

“The suffering is growing by the day, with almost 25 million people now requiring assistance,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the Security Council on Monday.

READ: Sudan war has displaced ‘over 14m’ people

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