PORT SUDAN: Sudanese paramilitary forces killed at least 80 people in a southeastern village, a medical source and witnesses said on Friday, even as US-sponsored talks sought to end 16 months of devastating war.
The assault occurred in Jalgini village in the state of Sennar on Thursday. “We received 55 dead and several of wounded at the hospital on Thursday, and 25 of them died on Friday, bringing the death toll to 80,” a source at Jalgini’s medical centre said.
A survivor said the paramilitaries had initially faced resistance from local villagers before returning in full force.
“Yesterday morning, three military vehicles attacked Jalgini. The residents resisted, prompting the retreat of the paramilitaries, who then returned with dozens of vehicles,” a Jalgini resident, who took his wounded son to the hospital, said. “They opened fire, torching homes and killing numerous people,” said the man.
“On Friday, some bodies were still strewn on the street.” Ceasefire talks began on Wednesday in Switzerland, hosted by US, Saudi and Swiss mediators, though the Sudanese army refused to take part. Previous rounds of negotiations in Jeddah in Saudi Arabia have failed to produce an agreement to end the fighting.
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which since April 2023 has been battling Sudan’s regular army, captured the Sennar state capital of Sinja in June. Since then, fighting in Sennar has displaced nearly 726,000 people, according to UN agency the International Organisation for Migration.
Many of them had fled the war in other parts of the northeast African country. The state connects central Sudan to the army-controlled southeast, where hundreds of thousands of people have sought refuge.
The RSF controls most of the capital Khartoum, the central state of Al Jazira, the vast western Darfur region and large swathes of Kordofan in the south.
“’Essential’ aid route”
The war pits army chief Abdel Fattah al Burhan against the RSF led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo. It has pushed the country of 48 million to the brink of famine, according to UN, and killed tens of thousands of people, with some estimates of up to 150,000, according to US envoy to Sudan Tom Perriello.
More than 10 million people are currently displaced across Sudan, most in areas facing worsening humanitarian conditions as fighting spreads. Both sides have been accused of war crimes, including deliberately targeting civilians and blocking humanitarian aid.
Despite the Sudanese army’s no-show at the Switzerland negotiations, Perriello said the talks were having some success, simply by casting international focus on Sudan at a time “when the world was turning its attention away”.
Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2024