The head of the UN mission in Sudan, Volker Perthes, expressed on Tuesday that the violence in the expansive Darfur region of western Sudan may amount to “crimes against humanity.”
Since mid-April, intense fighting has been ongoing in Sudan between the army led by General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhane and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) commanded by General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo.
These clashes are primarily concentrated in the capital city of Khartoum and in Darfur, where local militias, tribal fighters, and armed civilians have joined the conflict.
According to the NGO ACLED, the unrest has resulted in over 1,800 fatalities in the country, while the UN reports that two million people have been displaced.
Expressing his concerns in a statement, the UN envoy said, “As the situation in Darfur continues to worsen, I am particularly alarmed by the state of affairs in El-Geneina (West Darfur), where the violence has taken on ethnic dimensions.”
“The alleged large-scale attacks on civilians based on their ethnic origins, supposedly committed by Arab militias and armed men in RSF uniforms, are highly troubling and, if proven, could amount to crimes against humanity,” he cautioned.
Last week, the Sudanese government declared Perthes persona non grata, accusing him of displaying bias in the conflict. However, the UN Secretary General’s spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, stated that his status remained “unchanged.”
Despite several unsuccessful ceasefires, humanitarian organizations report a deterioration in the humanitarian situation in both Khartoum and Darfur.
Darfur governor Minni Minnawi, a former rebel leader now aligned with the army, called for an international investigation into the events unfolding in El-Geneina and Kutum (further east) via Twitter on Saturday.
In the early 2000s, General Daglo, who led the Janjaweed militia, implemented a scorched earth policy in Darfur under the orders of the then dictator, Omar al-Bashir.
The conflict resulted in an estimated death toll of around 300,000 individuals and nearly 2.5 million people displaced, according to the UN. In 2013, the Janjaweed officially transformed into the RSF, acting as the army’s paramilitary auxiliary.
Generals Al-Burhane and Daglo united forces in a coup in 2021 to overthrow the civilian government, with whom they had previously shared power since Bashir’s ousting in 2019. However, disagreements arose, and in the absence of an agreement regarding the integration of the RSF into the army, the situation escalated into a full-blown war.