‘The UN Secretary-General strongly condemns the attack reportedly carried out on 5 June by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the Wad Al-Noura village, Jazira state, which is said to have killed over 100 people’ said his spokesperson, underlying the year long civil war in Sudan that has imposed immense suffering on the Sudanese People due to continued hostilities. The conflict has killed tens of thousands of people and led to the displacement of millions, making it one of the most dire humanitarian crises on the planet. A crisis that has failed to capture the interest of the global community, who has their attention focused elsewhere.
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The Current Situation in Sudan
Beginning in April 2023, fighting between the rival Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has taken the lives of thousands of civilians and committed serious human right violations in the country. The United States has accused both the groups of committing war crimes and has also alleged that they have been involved in ethnic cleansing.
The conflict has also expanded into a proxy war with Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iran backing the SAF while the United Arab Emirates is allegedly supplying arms and other supplies to the RSF. The RSF also reportedly receives support from Chad and Russia.
Officials working on the conflict and aid workers have repeatedly expressed their exasperation at the lack of international attention and aid that the conflict is receiving. Alan Boswell, an expert on the region at the International Crisis Group said “You can’t help but watch the level of focus on crises like Gaza and Ukraine and wonder what just 5 percent of that energy could have done in a context like Sudan and how many thousands, tens of thousands of lives it could’ve saved.”
Brief Background of the Conflict
Sudan was a joint protectorate of Egypt and the UK known as the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium in the first half of the 20th century. However, this sovereignty was yielded to the Independent republic of Sudan in 1956. The New Republic now faced a host of challenges. It was located among some of the most violent states in the African subcontinent. Moreover it faced a serious internal divide between the country’s wealthier Northern region and its less developed Southern region. This divide led to two civil wars in the country, the second of which led to the formation of a new state in 2011 called the Republic of South Sudan, effectively splitting the region into two separate political entities.
Sudan’s post colonial history was also majorly marked by the dictatorship of Omar al-Bashir who seized power in a 1989 coup. He oversaw both the civil wars and also the war in Darfur, which was later labelled as a genocide against non-Arad populations by the International Criminal Court. Bashir’s extremely oppressive regime continued for 30 years at the end of which civilian protests calling for a democracy and different form of governance due to widespread distress which reduced the regime’s legitimacy. In 2019 a coup to overthrow the leader was carried out jointly by the SAF under the leadership of General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the RSF, a militia led by Mohamed Hamdan ‘Hemedti’ Dagalo.
Following the coup, an agreement for a transitional government was negotiated between the two groups. Burhan led the Transitional Sovereignty Council with Hemedti as his deputy. There were other leaders in the council, one of which included Abdalla Hamdok, who was designated the prime Minister. Subsequently SAF and RSF orchestrated another coup against the civilian leader and suspended the constitutional machinery. This development led to the two leaders fighting for the supreme position to rule the country, which has today culminated into the long drawn civil war in Sudan.
Humanitarian Conditions in Sudan
According to the International Organisation of Migration (IOM), since the start of the conflict in 2023, internal displacement in the country has reached the 10 million mark. One of the major reasons causing people to flee is food insecurity. Around 18 million people are reported to be acutely hungry while 3.6 million children are acutely malnourished. Apart from internal displacement, many people from Sudan have also fled to neighboring countries such as Chad, South Sudan and Egypt. The IOM stated many Sudanese people also take dangerous and irregular migration corridors to Tunisia, Libya and then further into Europe.
The World Health Organisation has also sounded an alarm over the dire healthcare conditions in the country. WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier stated that about 65 percent of the population in Sudan now lack healthcare resources. A record number of measle cases were also recorded in the region with other diseases such as malaria, Cholera and Dengue also on the rise.
Conclusion
Sudan lies on the brink of collapsing into a failed state and the threat of another full blown genocide is imminent. A reversal in the lack of international humanitarian aid can save the lives of millions and reinstate the belief in the collective power of the global community.
