ICC cites evidence of ‘war crimes’ in Sudan’s Darfur

NAIROBI — War crimes and crimes against humanity are being committed in Sudan’s western region of Darfur, where survivors have described rapes, killings, bombings, kidnappings and deliberate starvation by both sides, the International Criminal Court has told the United Nations Security Council.

Such crimes triggered a global outcry when the arid Darfur region was the scene of fighting two decades ago, leading to the conviction of Sudan’s then-president at the International Criminal Court on genocide charges. But the latest crimes, part of a new civil war in the country, have met a more muted global response amid crises in Gaza and Ukraine.

“People are being deprived of water and food. Rape and sexual violence are being weaponized. Abductions for ransom and to bolster the ranks of armed groups have become common practice,” Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan told the council on Thursday. “We have reasonable grounds to believe that war crimes and crimes against humanity have been and continue to be committed in Darfur.”

Most of Darfur is held by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), but the besieged city of El Fashir and a couple of surrounding towns are held by the military and its allies, the Joint Forces, a group of former rebels who have now allied with Sudan’s government.

The areas held by the RSF have been indiscriminately bombed by the military, and non-Arab ethnic civilians there have been subjected to rape and ethnic cleansing by the RSF.

In El Fashir, RSF forces are preventing food from entering the city. An RSF attack on the sprawling Zamzam camp nearby, previously home to 400,000 people, killed 11 aid workers.

One woman, described to The Washington Post the RSF attack on Zamzam in April and how she had sought shelter in the Sheikh Farah Mosque.

“Soldiers from the Rapid Support Forces stormed the mosque and started taking men from inside,” then shooting them, she said. Out of 16 men and boys, 14 died immediately, including her brother, a blind man and the son of the mosque sheikh. The soldiers shot her foot when she tried to help her brother.

“The soldiers went to the Relief International center,” she said. “I heard them discussing things with the team. Minutes later, I heard gunfire, killing nine people, including a woman and doctor.” Two other aid workers died later from their injuries.

In a report released earlier this month on the attack, Doctors Without Borders said “survivors of ground operations have reported systematic looting, the random or deliberate killing of civilians, and the burning of civilian buildings including private houses and markets. Sexual violence has been perpetrated on a large scale.”

“Abductions … have been a source of income for the RSF and their affiliates,” it added.

That trend has been documented by The Post by speaking to families who had relatives — including children — seized for forced labor, sexual slavery or ransom.

One woman who recently escaped from Zamzam to El Fashir almost 10 miles away said she had been stopped by RSF soldiers on the way. “They called us ‘town women,’ meaning army women,” she said. She had been molested, and other girls had been taken away and raped. “They were doing whatever they wanted to the women after killing the men.”

Most of the water towers and water pumps in El Fashir and Zamzam have been destroyed or don’t work any more, the report also said, fueling disease outbreaks. Hospitals in the city have been repeatedly bombed and shelled, and all but one have stopped functioning.

Doctors Without Borders warned that mass, ethnically-based killings of civilians are likely if the city falls. “The RSF and their allies have deliberately targeted non-Arab communities,” the humanitarian group said. “Witnesses report that RSF soldiers spoke of plans to ‘clean El Fashir’ of its non-Arab, and especially Zaghawa, community.”

Around 10,000 to 15,000 people were killed in similar circumstances when the city of Geneina fell to the RSF in 2023, the U.N. reported.

Starvation is also spreading in Darfur; after war erupted in April 2023, Sudan became the scene of the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. More than 30 million people need aid, but both warring parties frequently block access for humanitarian groups. Warehouses full of aid have been looted and aid workers kidnapped and murdered. Last month, five drivers were killed as the World Food Program tried to deliver a convoy of food to El Fashir. The U.N. has called for an investigation.

In its fight against the RSF, the military has relied on often indiscriminate aerial bombings that have frequently hit markets, homes and infrastructure. Human Rights Watch found that bombings of the city of Nyala hit residential and commercial neighborhoods and a grocery store, killing dozens of civilians each time. A bombing of Turra village, about 25 miles northwest of El Fashir, killed a least 126 people in March, according to the Darfur Victims Support Organization, a local human rights group.

For decades, the military has indiscriminately used “barrel bombs” — barrels filled with fuel, shrapnel and explosives — to target civilian areas. The market at Turra was hit by 10 such bombs on its busiest day, the organization said. An Amnesty International investigation into the military’s December bombing of the Kabkabiya also found that dozens of people were killed.