Sudan residents describe raids, evictions by RSF soldiers

World
By William

When two Rapid Support Forces (RSF) soldiers stormed Nadir el-Gadi’s home in Khartoum on April 23, they demanded to know which side of the Sudanese conflict he was supporting: the RSF or the Sudanese army.

The 77-year-old replied that he was on neither side.

“I said we are against this war. We are prisoners of this war,” el-Gadi told Al Jazeera on Saturday.

“They were suspicious,” said el-Gadi, adding that the soldiers claimed they were there to see if he was hiding enemy soldiers. “They said, ‘Are you sure there’s no one in this house?'”

The soldiers eventually left and el-Gadi was unharmed, but others had not been so lucky. The RSF has reportedly raided hundreds of homes, often evicting and assaulting residents or looting their property – sometimes both.

The raids are part of a wider trend in which the RSF has embedded itself in residential areas by turning apartments and even hospitals into military outposts, activists, witnesses and human rights groups said.

Before el-Gadi’s home was raided, his cousin had informed him that he was fleeing to Egypt with other relatives. He urged his uncle to come, but el-Gadi, a British-Sudanese national, said he was on a list of evacuees and expected the UK government to evacuate him within a week.

Appalled by the RSF soldiers, he called his cousin back to let him know he had changed his mind and wanted to go.

“Our cousin told us it wasn’t safe for us to stay [at home] no more,” el-Gadi said. “[My nephew] sent us an experienced driver and we left our house with two small bags.”

Occupy houses

In the first days after clashes between RSF fighters and the Sudanese army began on April 15, many people fled the Sudanese capital of Khartoum and later learned that RSF fighters had looted or occupied their homes.

Sara Awad recalls calling her neighbors on the 10th day of the conflict. She was told that RSF fighters had looted everything and taken control of the apartment building in which she lived.

The 38-year-old filmmaker’s apartment was close to the fighting, so she didn’t have time to pack. She grabbed essential documents and clean clothes and fled – leaving the rest of her belongings behind, including her camera and cat.

“I thought the fighting would stop in a few days and things would go back to normal,” she said. “I’ve been left in that apartment all my life.”

Another Khartoum resident, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals, said he sent a relative to retrieve vital documents when he learned that the RSF had occupied his family’s home after they fled.

“He went [to the home] and saw eight or nine [RSF] warriors there. He was able to get the documents. He got in and got out,” he said. “Sometimes you meet honest guys [in the RSF] who just want to make a quick buck. Other times you meet really cruel people.”

Dozens of people have posted similar stories on social media, mainly through Twitter and in private WhatsApp groups.

Aziz Musa, a president of a digital marketing agency in Sudan, posted that almost every house in his neighborhood is occupied by RSF fighters.

“RSF has looted almost every house and remains [inside] they 3-8 soldiers at a time,” he tweeted.

A Human Rights Watch (HRW) report released May 4 also cited several witnesses who said RSF fighters slept in their apartment buildings or fired anti-aircraft guns from their buildings or neighborhoods.

Referring to international law, HRW said that all parties to a conflict must prevent civilian objects from becoming deliberate targets of war.

“Both sides must abide by the laws of war, including the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks, take all possible measures to reduce civilian damage and enable the safe movement of civilians, treat all persons in custody humanely, and facilitate humanitarian access to those in need .” said HRW.

The Sudanese military could also be involved in violating these laws because of its role in indiscriminately shelling and bombing civilian neighborhoods without warning, the report said.

Disturb care

Along with residents of the capital, the RSF has also evicted medical personnel and taken control of 22 hospitals in Khartoum, according to a statement from resistance committees, neighborhood groups mobilizing to save people in the war.

Resistance committees have tried to compensate for the lack of medical facilities by opening so-called ’emergency rooms’. These are makeshift clinics that provide first aid to the injured.

However, the committees have neither the equipment nor the medics to save people from serious injuries such as gunshot wounds. Thousands of patients who required hospital treatment before the war — such as those who required kidney dialysis — are also expected to die if they haven’t already.

“We can’t take cases [of people] who have cancer or kidney failure,” said Dania Atabani, a member of a resistance committee, referring to the lack of capabilities of the makeshift clinics. “And if we can’t help people physically… we try to find other places or hospitals [where we can take them].”

Several witnesses said that the RSF has also taken control of one of the leading medical supply warehouses. The move has disrupted the supply of vital medicines such as insulin, according to the Sudanese Union of Pharmacists.

“The closure of the Medical Supplies Center is a health disaster as it provides life-saving medicines, including medicines for blood pressure, diabetes… and other medical equipment that is currently in short supply,” the union said in a Facebook post. rack.

“We condemn this criminal behavior and the systematic attack on health facilities as it is a brutal violation of patients’ right to receive their medicines,” the Union added.

El-Gadi, the 77-year-old who is now safe in the UK, is also a pharmaceutical supplier in Sudan. He said his company’s warehouse had been looted and accused criminals of exploiting the chaos to enrich themselves.

His associates have told him that looters have looted everything. They fired machine guns at security safes to pry them open and stole the money and gold locked inside. Cars, desks and tables were also stolen, while medicines were emptied from refrigerators, which would soon render them inoperative.

El-Gadi said one of his guards ran away and asked nearby RSF fighters to stop the looters, but they did nothing.

“[The RSF] told him to go get a gun and help himself…they said guns are available everywhere. That’s what they told him [Sudan] is the land of guns,” he said.

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