Nafie Ali Nafie accused of lying about torture acts in Sudan

The coordinator of the Sudanese Organisation for Defending Rights and Freedoms has accused Dr Nafie Ali Nafie, the former Presidential Adviser, of defaming his character and harmfully lying about acts of torture the coordinator was subjected to during a detention in 1989.

Dr Nafie has denied in a media interview that he has supervised the torture of Farouq Mohamed Ibrahim in detention, during Nafie's leadership of the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) in the early National Salvation Government’s days.

“This is a complete lie and a shame,” Farouq Ibrahim told Radio Dabanga in an interview on Tuesday, where he announced his intention to file a complaint against the former NISS chief. Nafie was also Senior Presidential Adviser and Minister of Federal Affairs.

He said that Nafie was the one who questioned him on 30 November, 1989, about what was said in the meeting of the teaching staff union of the University of Khartoum, of which Nafie was a member himself. He was tortured and threatened during the twelve days of his detention, in the presence of Nafie.

“Dr. Nafie did not hide his personality during the interrogation and was then clearly known to me because he was my student and a colleague of the university staff,” the coordinator of the Sudanese human rights organisation said.

Farouq Ibrahim said that he was subjected to real threats of murder and rape. He was beaten with whips and bare hands and kicked, and tortured in various ways in a wet room.

“With me in the same prison were eighteen union leaders,” he added, “who were also subjected to what I had suffered. They were Akasha Abdelrahman, late El Sadig El Shami, and late engineer Hashim Mohamed Ahmed.”

He explained that he filed a law suit against Nafie before at the Constitutional Court, but it was not considered a case because of the constitutional impunity of the security apparatus, along with limitations of the duration on the case. Farouq Ibrahim told Radio Dabanga that he will now file the law suit before civil courts, that might adjudicate it.

Denial

Dr Nafie Ali Nafie denied that he supervised the torture of Faroug Mohamed Ibrahim in 1989 during his term as security apparatus chief, in an interview with El Yaum El Tali newspaper in its Tuesday edition.

Nafie: “I swear to Almighty God I have not seen Farouq until now […] I have only seen his picture on newspapers.”

He also denied having supervised the 'ghost houses' in the security detentions outside the framework of the security apparatus. He stressed that the detention places are known at Kober Prison.

Since the National Congress Party came to power by a military coup in 1989, it has arrested political opponents. Many were reportedly tortured in prisons and so-called ghost houses, chambers desgined specifically for various types of torturing.