‘Unamid downsizing spells dire consequences for Darfur’

The Sudanese Communist Party has condemned “the ongoing government violations and the terrible security deterioration in large parts of Darfur.” A statement issued by the party’s political bureau has warned of “dire consequences of the decision to downsize Unamid, which has ignored the security situation in Darfur”.

Siddig Yousef of the leadership of the Communist Party denounced the ongoing violations by the government in Darfur, referring to the attacks on Khamsa Dagayig camp in Zalingei and Aradeiba camp in Garsila in Central Darfur, as well as the repeated attempts by the government to use force to dismantle Kalma camp in Nyala, capital of South Darfur.

He said that “the regime is waiting for Unamid to leave the tribal militias to restart their criminal activity”.

Yousef said aerial bombing using military aircraft on villages has forced tens of thousands of unarmed civilians to flee again under harsh humanitarian conditions.

The Communist has Party called on international and human rights organisations and the UN Security Council to take urgent measures to protect the lives and property of the people of Darfur, this as well as calling on the Human Rights Council to take measures to ensure justice and bring those involved in these violations to the courts.

He called on the people of Darfur to stand firm so as to confront the policies of the Salvation Regime aiming at fragmenting the unity of the province and ethnic cleansing.

SLM-AW

SLM-AW head Abdelwahid El Nur told Radio Dabanga that “the targeting of displaced camps by government militias, the latest of which is Khamsa Dagayig camp in Zalingei and Aradeiba camp in Garsila, comes as part of the government’s plan to dismantle and demolish the displaced camps”.

He explained that the government is aiming to obliterate the crimes of which the camps are witness, namely the killing of civilians, their displacement and putting them in displacement camps.

He said that the government has begun to harass the displaced by pressure on organisations to reduce food and medicine rations by conducting inventory of the displaced through their agents’ move to spread insecurity in the camps by attacking them through their militias to force them to leave these camps.  

El Nur said that the movement’s forces have managed to foil the government’s plan to control Jebel Marra by confronting the attack of the government forces and its militias in areas of east and south of Jebel Marra.

He said that the government has repeated its annual attempts to attack the movement’s sites to control Jebel Marra.

He pointed out that the movement’s forces have confronted them east and south Jebel Marra defeated them and forced them to retreat, and stressed the movement’s full readiness to confront the government’s hired militias and defeat them if they return to attack again.

Unamid

Last month the head of Unamid, Jeremiah Mamabolo, briefed the UN Security Council (UNSC) on the current situation in Darfur.

“The general security situation in Darfur remains calm, except for sporadic clashes between the Sudan Liberation Army of Mr. Abdul Wahid [Abdelwahid El Nur], government forces and nomads in Jebel Marra,” Mamabolo stated. “It is imperative that concerted efforts be exerted towards mobilisation of financial resources to consolidate and sustain the prevailing peace and stability in the region,” he said.

However Mamabolo’s version is contradicted by Jehanne Henry, team leader of the Human Rights Watch Africa Division, who  said in a comment on that “there’s a real risk the dire protection needs of civilians will be ignored or forgotten” – with “such a gloss-over assessment from peacekeepers”.

Henry mentioned the recent torching of a number of villages by “the notoriously abusive Rapid Support Forces” (RSF), Sudan’s main militia, the “killing at least 23 civilians and displacement of about 15,000 people into the mountains”.