Sudan: Legal delegation visits Darfur detainees in Omdurman prison

A delegation from the Darfur Bar Association, Emergency Lawyers, and partners visited El Huda Prison in Omdurman on Wednesday afternoon to speak to detainees from El Geneina in West Darfur.

The delegation listened to detainees from Darfur, including a secondary school teacher and eight minors, two of whom have reached the age of majority during 16 months in detention. The wife and child of one of the detainees, who is the only breadwinner for his family, died while he was in detention.

Among the testimonies provided by the detainees, are grave human rights violations committed against the detainees from Darfur, who were placed under the name “Trusteeship [Department] of West Darfur” in El Huda Prison without being charged.

National Committee for the Protection of Civilians

On Wednesday, the National Committee for the Protection of Civilians was launched in Khartoum, and its meeting resulted in the activation of already existing committees and the formation of new ones.

Prof Mohamed El Fateh Yagoub from the committee’s secretariat said that it was decided to form a new committee for communication and to expand the already existing medical, political, and legal committees.

He explained that it was decided to continue working parallelly on a draft regulation framework, and at the same time starting work in the Legal Committee to collect information about victims of human rights violations and to make an integrated file of incidents and victims from 2013 through the escalation of the revolution that started in December 2018.

The collection of information in this way includes the victims of violence in Darfur and the Two Areas (South Kordofan and Blue Nile state) and ends with the victims of the October 25, 2021 coup.

Yagoub described the meeting as good, and the next meeting will be on July 23 this month to continue the committee’s work.

Reconciliation agreement

As previously reported by Radio Dabanga, on Wednesday last week, leaders of the Gimir tribe and a number of Arab tribes signed a final reconciliation agreement with the West Darfur government in El Geneina to end the conflicts witnessed in the area of Kulbus, which claimed the lives of more than 125 people and wounded dozens.

The signing ceremony was witnessed by Mohamed Hamdan ‘Hemeti’ Dagalo, Deputy-Chairman of the Sovereignty Council and Commander-in-Chief of the infamous Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the governor of West Darfur, and military, security, and tribal leaders.

According to the Sudan News Agency (SUNA), Hemeti addressed the signing ceremony and said that this is the fifth peace agreement to be signed in West Darfur. He described it as the best document so far and said that this is the last real signing and reconciliation between the tribes. “With this, we have covered all tribal problems in the state”, he said.

Earlier this week, a leader of the Communist Party of Sudan, member of the Darfur Bar Association, and human rights lawyer Saleh Mahmoud asserted in an interview with Radio Dabanga that the reconciliation agreements brokered by Hemeti in Darfur are “superficial, do not represent the interests of the people, and will not lead to real stability in Darfur”.