Police, judiciary return to Kutum, North Darfur

The police have returned to Kutum locality in North Darfur after an absence of nearly four years owing to a State of Emergency.

The Commissioner of Kutum, Col. Adam Abdelkarim Tirab, hailed the return of the regular police as “an important step to extend the prestige of the state, the city and restore judicial and police services in the city”.

Speaking to Radio Dabanga, the Commissioner said that “police and prosecutors arrived in Kutum locality on Monday. They have the most modern equipment.”

Commissioner Tirab announced that North Darfur’s Governor, who previously pledged to rebuild the police presence in Kutum, will arrive on Wednesday to kick-off the process of rebuilding the main police station, as well as courts and other buildings destroyed in the violence of 2012.

Following repeated complaints from local residents, the new Governor Yusuf Abdul Wahid has pledged to send 500 police, three prosecutors, and two of the local judiciary, to fill the security vacuum.

Hostilities

Waves of hostilities in the locality began in September 2012. The two main accepted reasons for it are the assassination of El Waha’s Commissioner on 1 August and the assassination attempt on Kutum’s Commissioner on 4 September.

The first incident allegedly led to looting and violence in Kutum and in the Kassab and Fata Borno displaced camps. The second supposedly led to the killings of policemen, of border guards and to the burning of the police station in Kutum by the Central Reserve Forces (Abu Tira).

The Governor of North Darfur then announced a State of Emergency, installed a military Commissioner in the locality, and appointed the military to take on policing duties in an attempt to restore peace and stability.

The result was that the 55,000 people of Kutum locality have lived in a security vacuum for nearly four years.