Humanitarian project leader arrested in East Darfur

The head of of a youth project to aid the poor in East Darfur’s Adila and Abu Karinka was arrested in Adila town on Friday.

Azrag Hasan Humeida, the head of the Adila and Abu Karinka Youth Initiative, was detained immediately after his return from Khartoum, and taken to Ed Daein, the capital of East Darfur.

An activist told Radio Dabanga that the Youth Initiative recently started a project to support the poorest families in Adila and Abu Karinka localities with small enterprises, “to help to survive the difficult economic situation, exacerbated by the armed conflicts in the region”.

He pointed out that members of the ruling National Congress Party in Adila locality, headed by Commissioner Breima Mousa, “who want to control the project within their party line and do not allow any independent civil initiative”.

In a statement on Saturday, the members of the Youth Initiative called for Humeida’s immediate release. They expressed their serious concerns about his transfer to Ed Daein.

“The majority of the residents of the state capital belong to the Rizeigat tribe, and so we fear for his life,” the source said.

The Maaliya, to which Humeida belongs, and the Rizeigat are both Arab nomadic communities that have a long history of violent disputes over land and grazing rights in East Darfur.