South Darfur displaced fear dismantling of Kalma camp

On Tuesday, a number of people from Kalma camp for the displaced in South Darfur who are residing in Khartoum organised a protest march against the repeated attacks on the camp. The joint UN-AU Mission in Darfur officially handed its Tawila base to the government of North Darfur.

People from Kalma camp, with more than 100,000 residents one of the largest camps for displaced in Darfur, consider the growing insecurity in the camp a forebode of the dismantling of the camp by the authorities.

The protest march moved to the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Justice, and the office of the European Union.

The demonstrators carried banners demanding an end to the recurrent attacks on Kalma, and accusing the governor of South Darfur of planning to dismantle the camp.

They handed a memorandum to the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Justice, and the European Union in which they demanded an end to the attacks and disarmament of all the gunmen in the region.

They want the attackers to be held accountable, the state governor replaced, detainees released, and a stop to the detention of youth at the gates of the camp.

In March, the General Coordination of Camps for the Displaced and Refugees in South Darfur also demanded the Sudanese government to dismiss the South Darfur governor. The displaced accused him of supplying tribal groups with weapons that were used in the camps.

UNAMID

The joint United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) has officially handed its Tawila base to the government of North Darfur on Tuesday. After the handover ceremony, the authorities in El Fasher confirmed that the mission's equipment and offices will be used in civil work.

UNAMID has been gradually handing over its bases since the UN decided to set December 31, 2020, as the final date of exit of the mission. It was deployed in Darfur in December 2007, with a mandate to protect the people of Darfur against hostilities. It has been the world’s second largest international peacekeeping force, after the force in Congo, with an annual budget of $1.35 billion and almost 20,000 troops.

The exit of the hybrid mission has stirred up many protests throughout the country as many fear that, with the mission leaving, security will decrease and violence and crime rates will go up.