Sudan: The Forgotten War

The biggest humanitarian crisis ever recorded – The IRC

25 million, over 50% of Sudan’s population, are starving – The IPC??

12 million forced to flee their homes – The IOM (UN Organisation)?

15,000 confirmed killed with estimates up to 150,000 - US Special Envoy for Sudan?

For almost 2 years a civil war - often labelled a proxy war due to external funding - has torn apart Sudan leading to a brutal humanitarian catastrophe.?

A war with no end in sight, waged by two parties both showing a lack of care for innocent human life with horrific crimes committed on the civilian population.?

As a consequence, civilians have faced extremely harsh conditions with the UN describing the situation as “one of the worst humanitarian crises in recent history” and the IRC stating it is “the biggest humanitarian crisis ever recorded”

In this blog, I aim to shed light on this forgotten war through three questions - What’s causing the war? What challenges are the citizens facing? And what can we do to help the people of Sudan??

What caused the war??

To understand this war, we have to dive in to the recent history of Sudan.??

Sudan, a country with a history of military coups was again hit with a coup in 1989, in which Omar El Bashir, then a general in the Sudanese army, appointed himself President of Sudan.??

Understandably Bashir became a widely disliked figure causing country-wide protests including the 2003 uprising in Darfur.??

With the Sudanese Army (SAF), led by Abdel Fattah al Burhan, being more occupied in the South, Bashir armed local Arab militias, known as ‘the Janjaweed’, to fight against the predominantly non-Arab rebel forces. This led to the Darfur genocide.?

Both the Janjaweed and the SAF murdered an estimated 200,000 people with the ICC indicting several individuals in 2009 for crimes against humanity (including the president Omar El Bashir himself).??

Years later, the Janjaweed were rebranded as the Rapid Military Support Forces (RSF) led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (widely known as ‘Hemeti’) which in 2017 was declared an official paramilitary unit by Bashir.?

In 2018, the Government budget dedicated two thirds of its total budget to the security sector. With the economy tanking and civilians unable to afford basic necessities, this further ignited the anger of the people – causing huge protests across Sudan.?

At first, Bashir refused to leave office with the RSF and SAF backing him and suppressing protests. However, after continued public uproar for months on end, both armed forces came to the realisation that Bashir needed replacing. So, in April 2019, Hemeti’s RSF and Burhan’s SAF removed Bashir from office and took control of the country.

Initially, the army announced it would oversee a transition to a democratic government, as requested by the public. As per the agreement, the transitional council appointed a new Prime Minister in Abdullah Hamdok. However, shortly after in October 2021 the army went against the agreement with an attempted coup once again. Hamdok resigned in January 2022, making Burhan the country's de facto leader and Hemeti the Vice Chair.

Hemeti however was not comfortable with being second in power and over time, the RSF started to move away from the army and began acting more independently.?

After another year of protests, Burhan, Hemeti and others signed another deal promising a new democratic civilian- led government once again. However, Burhan and Hemeti disagreed on one part of the deal - Hemetis RSF would have to integrate into the army, limiting his power. Hemeti sought a 10-year integration whilst Burhan opted for just two.

With tensions rising and the threat of war looming, both leaders deployed men across the country until in April 2023, both sides accused each other of attacking their bases in the capital city, Khartoum. From there, the war which is still ongoing today, began…?

Who’s fueling the war??

As mentioned earlier, this conflict is often labelled a proxy war, but why is that? Well, this war involves more than just the two aforementioned parties.??

Both the RSF and SAF have been funded and supported by foreign nations, one of which is the UAE.

Sudan is key to the UAE’s current strategy in Africa, in which they aim to boost economic presence and deepen diplomatic ties, with investments of over $60 billion in the continent over the past decade. Having already invested over $7 billion in Sudan from ports to education to agriculture, securing further economic control as well as political control is in their best interests.??

And one of their key economic interests is gold. The UAE has worked to establish itself as one of the world’s leading gold marketplaces, however evidence (including a UK home office report) reveals that much of this gold is imported through illegal pathways. With the RSF controlling much of Sudan'’s gold trade, it is reported that Sudan exports around $16 billion of gold to the UAE annually.

UN experts have described evidenced-backed claims of the UAE providing military support to the RSF as “credible”. Although the UAE denies these claims, the same UN document provided evidence of the UAE sending weapons to the RSF “several times per week”.?

On the other hand, Egypt has close ties with Burhan and the SAF. Egypt has conducted joint military exercises with the Sudanese forces and there have been reports of Egypt providing the SAF with military intelligence and tactical support. Iranian drones have also reportedly been used by SAF.?

As stated by Alex De Waal, Executive Director of the World Peace Foundation:?

“Sudan has become a cockpit in which rising powers of the Middle East seek to gain an advantage over their rivals”?

The UK has also not had the best track record regarding Sudan.?

A report by the Guardian stated that UK Foreign Officials held secret talks with the RSF, which human rights groups denounced due to their record of committing ethnic cleansing and war crimes. Another report claimed that the UK ‘tried to suppress criticism’ of the UAE’s role in arming the RSF by discouraging states from criticizing the UAE.?

How is the war effecting life in Sudan??

In a bid to gain power over large areas of the country, similar crimes that the Janjaweed committed 20 years ago during the Darfur genocide are committed today by the rebranded RSF.??

However, according to various reports not only are these tactics being used to gain control, but there’s clear evidence of the RSF attempting to wipe out non-Arab ethnic groups, as done previously in Darfur.?

Civilians are murdered, raped, forced to bury themselves alive... but one of the RSF’s most abused war crimes is what is known as the ‘scorched earth’ tactic - using fire to kill, displace communities and completely destroy livestock and infrastructure leaving nothing to return to.?

Entire villages and cities have been burned to the ground. A team of researchers from the Centre for Information Resilience (CIR) documented more than 235 fires that broke out in towns and villages across the country since April 2023.??

And it's not just residential buildings being destroyed. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, stated 80 percent of hospitals have been put out of service.?

In the same address, the rights chief also highlighted another weapon of war the RSF is using extensively:

“Sexual violence as a weapon of war, including rape, has been a defining – and despicable – characteristic of this crisis since the beginning”.?

The situation is so dire that even UN facilities have been exploited, with a report to the UN Security Council stated that in the city of Geneina girls as young as 14 were raped by RSF fighters in a UN storage facility that they’d taken control of, as well as in their homes, with racial slurs towards non-Arab communities forming part of the attacks.?

However, it’ is not just the RSF harming civilians; the SAF is far from perfect either.?

CIR analysis has shown videos of the aftermath of reported SAF airstrikes with extensive fire damage in civilian areas. An article by Al Jazeera stated that both the RSF and army are looting and restricting access of aid, according to aid workers, Sudanese medics and experts. A UN report from June 2023 revealed that at least 61 offices and 57 warehouses belonging to aid groups had been looted. All of this whilst over half the population of Sudan, 25.6 million people, face starvation.?

What’s the situation like now??

As of now, it’s looking highly unlikely that the long-awaited transition to a civilian-led democratic government and the end of both SAF and RSF rule will come to fruition anytime soon.

Currently the SAF has control of parts of East Sudan and the capital Khartoum – which they recently regained control of after almost a year of RSF control on the Capital – however the RSF have control of most of the West.?

With many ongoing battles for control, the most significant currently is the RSF's effort to seize North Darfur.?

Darfur is a huge region in Sudan made up of five states. The RSF have control of four states and are now trying to win North Darfur, a key region for its large border with Chad (from which the militia group have been smuggling weapons into Sudan), and in particular the capital city of the state - El Fasher.

The battle for El Fasher is a major concern for all those involved in and observing the conflict.

El Fasher has been a sanctuary city where hundreds of thousands sought refuge, both from the current war in other parts of the country and the Darfur genocide in the early 2000s. The city is predominantly occupied by non-Arab ethnic groups and so there is deep concern that the RSF may initiate another genocide or ethnic cleansing campaign against the city’s residents.?

The RSF already having tried to cut off water to the city, whilst civilians are already starving to death. Doctors Without Borders estimated that in one refugee camp in Southern El Fasher, a child is dying every 2 hours from malnutrition.?

How can we help??

We may feel it’s difficult for us to do anything to help. A civil war happening 3,500 miles away, for which our country has very little political involvement in. But we must use the tools at our disposal.

It should however be noted, that although the UK may not currently have substantial political involvement in Sudan’s situation, it holds the position of penholder on Sudan at the UN Security Council.

As penholder it’s the UK’s responsibility to lead negotiations and drafting of resolutions related to Sudan. Therefore our country does have an important role to play and the more we speak up and raise concerns, the more pressure the UK will have to prioritise Sudan at the UN.

Just a few months ago American rapper Macklemore announced that he wouldn’t be performing in the UAE due to their ties with the RSF. This led to huge news outlets across the world from the BBC to Reuters to CBS all covering the situation in Sudan. Below is a snippet of his statement on Instagram:?

This is the power of our voices.?

And I understand none of us have that large of a platform, but small steps lead to big changes and how is it that he learned about what's happening in Sudan? The voices of his supporters.?

Educate others about Sudan, speak up on social media, sign petitions, attend protests.... No effort is a wasted effort.?Every little action helps to build pressure and influence those in power.

And with 25 million people starving, whilst aid is being blocked and stolen by both sides, the Sudanese are in desperate need of our donations.?

The link below contains a handful of on the ground Sudanese charities/fundraisers helping those in need.?

https://www.nasalsudan.com/donate??

To stay up to date with what’s happening in Sudan I would recommend the following pages on Instagram/Twitter (links attached to images):?

Sudan Updates - https://www.instagram.com/sudan.updates/?