The NGO has documented atrocities during an April attack by paramilitary forces on a North Darfur facility.
Rights group Amnesty International has called for a war crimes investigation into an attack by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on a camp for displaced persons in Sudan’s North Darfur state earlier this year.
In a report released by the NGO on Wednesday, the RSF’s account of atrocities a A massive attack At Zamzam Camp. The RSF has been repeatedly accused of indiscriminate killings and gang rapes, among other crimes, during the ongoing conflict with Sudan’s military government since April 2023.
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The drought-hit camp came under attack as paramilitary forces besieged al-Fashar, the capital of North Darfur state. The RSF now has complete control over the state and has push east In the vast central Sudanese region of West Kordofan, the displaced added to the millions.
The attacks on Zamzam between April 11 and 13 – the largest for internally displaced people in North Darfur state – saw RSF soldiers deploy explosives in populated areas and shoot randomly in residential areas, according to reports.
The document details dozens of accounts of deadly attacks on civilians, with witnesses witnessing RSF soldiers fatally shooting at least 47 civilians hiding in their homes, fleeing the violence or taking refuge in mosques.
Amnesty International Secretary-General Agnes Callamard said, “RSF’s horrific and deliberate attack on the desperate, starving civilians of Jamzam camp once again exposed its alarming disregard for human life.
“Civilians were mercilessly attacked, killed, robbed of the necessities of life and livelihood, and released without justice.”
In the attack, RSF soldiers deliberately set fire to houses and other buildings and committed acts of “rape and looting,” causing an estimated 400,000 people to flee the camp in two days, the report said.
‘Shooting Anywhere’
Based on interviews with 29 people – witnesses, survivors and relatives of victims, as well as video and satellite images – the report is the latest to accuse the RSF of atrocities, including mass killings, during Sudan’s 30-month war. Summary execution and rape.
The military government’s Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) are also accused of many war crimes.
The depictions given by survivors of the Zamzam attack, of RSF soldiers firing and indiscriminately setting fire to fleeing residents, have become all too familiar.
“(RSF) soldiers were just shouting and firing everywhere, so many people were killed,” one man told Amnesty.
Another said: “You couldn’t tell where the gunfire was coming from. It was everywhere.”
A woman volunteering for a non-governmental organization described how an RSF fighter fired randomly from his vehicle while driving near the camp’s main market.
Amnesty said that firing without a specific military target could constitute an indiscriminate attack, a serious violation of international humanitarian law.
Another man described how he had seen about 15 armed men enter his compound and fatally shoot his 80-year-old brother and 30-year-old nephew.
“No one is concerned about our situation,” he said.
There is no end in sight
Amnesty once again criticized the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for supporting the RSF – a widespread accusation.
The UAE has strongly denied that it provides arms or financial support to the RSF.
Since hostilities began in April 2023, the SAF and RSF have been locked in a brutal conflict that has killed thousands and displaced nearly 12 million.
Armistice efforts did not make much headway. RSF announced a A unilateral ceasefire Last month, after a “Quad” peace plan was issued by a group of mediators including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and the United States.
However, the continued clashes show that neither side wants to end the war.