GENEVA — The UN human rights office said in a new report on Friday that dozens of people, including children, have been victims of rape and other forms of sexual violence in the ongoing conflict in Sudan, attacks that could amount to war crimes.
Sudan plunged into chaos in mid-April when clashes broke out in the capital Khartoum between rival Sudanese forces – the country’s army, led by General Abdel Fattah Burhan, and a paramilitary faction known as the Rapid Support Forces, commanded by General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo.
The fighting quickly spread across the African country, mainly urban areas but also the restive western region of Darfur, and has so far killed at least 12,000 people and forced more than 8 million to flee their homes, the report said.
The report, which covers a period from the outbreak of fighting to December 15, documents abuses in a country that has recently been largely inaccessible to aid groups and human rights monitors, highlighting the impact of a conflict that in some places has been overshadowed by war. clouded. such as Gaza and Ukraine.
The report found that at least 118 people had been victims of sexual violence, including rape – with many of the attacks committed by members of the paramilitary forces in their homes and on the streets.
One woman, the UN said, “was held in a building and repeatedly gang-raped over a period of 35 days.”
The report also highlighted the recruitment of child soldiers on both sides of the conflict.
“Some of these violations would amount to war crimes,” said UN human rights chief Volker Türk, calling for swift, thorough and independent investigations into alleged rights violations and abuses.
The report is based on interviews with more than 300 victims and witnesses, some conducted in neighboring Ethiopia and Chad, where many Sudanese have fled, along with analysis of photographs, videos and satellite images from the conflict zones.
The devastation of the war continues even after the period examined, the UN said.
The UN cited a video that emerged last week from North Kordofan state showing men wearing Sudanese army uniforms and carrying severed heads of members of the rival paramilitary faction.
“For almost a year, the stories from Sudan have been of death, suffering and despair, as the senseless conflict and human rights violations continue with no end in sight,” Türk said.
“Guns must be silenced and civilians must be protected,” he added.
Seif Magango, a regional spokesperson for the U.N. human rights office, said Friday from Nairobi, Kenya, via videoconference at the U.N. briefing in Geneva that “the number of displaced people (in Sudan) has now crossed the 8 million mark, what should everyone engage.”
Earlier in February, UN Secretary-General António Guterres told reporters there was no military solution to the conflict in Sudan and urged rival generals to start talking about ending the conflict. He stressed that continued fighting “will not bring any solution, so we must stop this as soon as possible.”