28 protestors still detained in South Darfur – Human Rights Commission asked to intervene

A group of 16 lawyers affiliated with the Darfur Bar Association (DBA) demand Sudan’s National Human Rights Commission intervene immediately in the case of 28 people who were detained in Gireida in South Darfur without being charged in June.

Accused of being members of the Alliance for Freedom and Change, the detainees were taken from their homes and offices or at the market, and transferred to prison cells in the army garrison in the South Darfur capital Nyala three weeks ago.

They are still in custody, although the lawyers submitted a request to the authorities of South Darfur to release them or to take them to court if there are any legitimate charges against them.

Memorandum

The DBA lawyers said in the memorandum they submitted to the National Human Rights Commission that the 28 detainees from Gireida include teachers, secondary school students (three of whom are minors), merchants, and camp sheikhs. They say that the detainees “did not commit any crime stipulated in any law”.

The lawyers further state that the “illegal detention” of the activists, without charges or judicial supervision by a prosecutor or court, is “a clear form of discrimination against them, which is in contravention of Sudan’s obligations as it ratified the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination”.

The memorandum demanded that the legal and humanitarian rights of the detainees are protected and that the authorities of South Darfur are informed of the need to release them immediately.

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