UN Sudan report highlights ‘atrocity after atrocity’

Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield US Representative to the United Nations, brought attention to the harrowing findings of the recently released five-member UN Panel of Experts report on Sudan, in a solemn address preceding the Security Council consultations at the UN, yesterday.

Describing the UN Panel of Experts* report as “thorough,” Thomas-Greenfield underscored its distressing contents. “52 pages of stomach-turning findings, atrocity after atrocity, after atrocity laid out in horrifying detail,” she remarked.

She proceeded to read distressing excerpts from the report, detailing the uninhibited devastation and violence perpetrated in Sudan. “Schools, hospitals, markets, government buildings, and humanitarian assets were looted, mostly by RSF and allied militias, and destroyed by shelling,” she recounted. “Women and girls, some as young as 14 years old, were raped by RSF elements… RSF placed snipers on the main road who indiscriminately targeted civilians.”

Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield also highlighted the report’s inclusion of gruesome photographs depicting the targeted violence against the Masalit community in West Darfur. The report suggests that the death toll of the ethnic cleansing in El Geneina is at least 10,000 to 15,000, far higher than any previous estimate given.

“This is just a snapshot of the death, destruction, depravity that has defined this conflict,” she lamented, emphasising the urgent need for action to halt the regional arms transfers fuelling the crisis.

Reflecting on her visit to Sudanese refugees in Adré, Chad, Thomas-Greenfield conveyed the profound suffering she witnessed, particularly among malnourished children.

Expressing dismay at the inadequacy of international response, she asserted, “The international community is not doing nearly enough to address this dire crisis.”

Promising continued leadership from the United States, Thomas-Greenfield called upon other stakeholders, including the African Union and leaders across East Africa and the Gulf, to take decisive action. She urged the Security Council to break its silence and translate words into meaningful intervention.

“It is my hope that the sobering report will at long last shake the world from its indifference to the horrors playing out before our eyes,” she concluded, appealing for resolute efforts to end the conflict and alleviate the grief of millions in Sudan.

* The Panel of Experts on Sudan was established by the UN Security Council in resolution 1591 on 29 March 2005. The panel was originally comprised of four experts and based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Since 2012 the panel has been home-based. By resolution 1713 of 29 September 2006, the council added a fifth expert to enable the panel to better carry out its work. The council has extended its mandate on a number of occasions, the last time in March last year, through March 12 this year.