ICC prosecutor urges world to 'stop the bloodshed' in Sudan before it slips out of control
NEW YORK CITY: Violence in Sudan has escalated over the past six months, the International Criminal Court prosecutor said Monday, with reports of rape, a crime against of children and persecution on a massive scale.
“Terrorism has become a common currency,” Karim Khan told a United Nations Security Council meeting, “and terrorism is not felt by people with guns but by people running, often with nothing, hungry.”
Fighting between rival military factions has raged in Sudan for more than a year. Since it started in April 2023, about 19,000 people have died. More than 10 million people have been displaced within the country and more than 2 million have fled to neighboring countries as refugees, making it the world's largest displacement crisis. – living in the world.
The country is on the brink of famine as a food crisis looms, and many families are said to be often without food.
Khan said the ICC is prioritizing investigations into allegations of crimes against, and affecting children, and gender-based crimes. These “gross violations of human rights, mass violations of personal dignity” continue to be fueled by “arming, financial support from various sectors, and political triangulation that leads for the non-responsibility of the international community,” he added.
His comments came during the final annual Security Council briefing on justice-related activities in Darfur. Almost 20 years after the council referred the situation in Darfur to the ICC, the arrest warrants issued by the court against former President Omar Al-Bashir, former ministers Ahmad Mohammed Harun and Abdel Raheem Mohammed Hussein, and former commander-in-chief. The Justice and Equality Movement, Abdallah Banda Abakaer Nourain, is always prominent.
Khan said the failure to implement arrest warrants for the accused had many negative consequences, including “a state of impunity and an outbreak of violence since April (2023), and continuing.” continues today, (which) the fighters think they can get away with killing and raping; center of other conflicts, hot war in other parts of the world; but we have forgotten the plight of the people of Darfur, we have forgotten our responsibility according to the United Nations; (and) the feeling that i Darfur or Sudan is a lawless zone where people can act recklessly, based on their worst inclinations, their worst nature, the politics of hatred and power, the opportunity to profit.”
He called on the members of the council to “return to normal” the call for justice.
In comments made to the two warring factions, the Sudanese Army and the Rapid Support Forces, as well as “those who finance them, supply them with weapons, give orders, receive certain benefits,” said Khan said his office is investigating and “using our resources as effectively as we can to ensure that what happened since April last year is subject to the rules of international law.” It is about humanity and it must be seen that all human lives should be seen as having equal value.”
He said that after “great difficulty” Sudanese authorities were working with ICC investigators who were able to enter Port Sudan, gather evidence and contact General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, the commander of the Sudanese Army and the country's leadership.
“But one swallow does not fit in the summer,” Khan added while stressing the need for “continued and deepening cooperation with the Sudanese Army, with General Al-Burhan and his progressive government.”
He said that “one concrete way in which this commitment to accountability, and zero tolerance for impunity, can be demonstrated in the proper implementation of court orders,” including the arrest of former minister Harun and his arraignment.
However, Khan said the most recent major effort to contact the leadership of the Rapid Support Force proved fruitless.
Meanwhile, he said, ICC investigators have visited neighboring Chad several times and gathered “valuable testimony” from displaced Sudanese nationals living there as refugees. settlement.
They met with representatives of Sudanese civil society in Chad, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Europe, he added, “to get and preserve their accounts and stories, analyze them and synthesize them, to see what a crime, if anything, it shows and who is responsible for the hell on earth that is being unleashed in such a stubborn, relentless way against the people of Darfur.
Khan said his office has used technological tools to gather and collect various forms of evidence from phone calls, videos and audio tapes, and that this “proves how critical it is to pierce the veil of immunity.” .”
The joint efforts of investigators, analysts, lawyers and members of civil society have produced significant progress, he added, and he expressed hope that it would soon be possible to announce that arrest warrants had been requested. people who are considered the most responsible. because of the crime in the country.
Meanwhile, Khan sounded a wider alarm about what he described as “a trapezoid of chaos in that part of the continent”.
He continued: “If one draws a line from the Libyan Mediterranean, down to the Red Sea in Sudan, and then draws a line to sub-Saharan Africa, and then to the Atlantic, together with Boko Haram causing instability, chaos. and the suffering in Nigeria, and then back to Sudan, (we) see the map and the countries that may be troubled or damaged by the concentration of chaos and suffering.”
He warned the members of the National Security Council that in addition to the concern about the rights of the people of Darfur, we have reached a point where a Pandora's box of ethnic, racial, religious interests can be opened. -religion, sect (and) business. will be released.”
He added that “they will no longer be vulnerable to the political power of the great powers of the world, or even to this council.” We need real action now to stop the bloodshed… in Sudan.”
