(Khartoum) At least 213 people have been killed in four days of violence in Darfur, according to the authorities of this region of western Sudan, clashes condemned by the UN which called on Wednesday for a “rapid” and “independent” investigation. “.
Updated yesterday at 4:08 p.m.
The violence began Friday in the town of Krink, mainly inhabited by the Massalit tribe, and spread to El-Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, some 80 km away.
According to the General Coordination for Refugees and Displaced Persons in Darfur, the violence erupted when armed fighters from Arab tribes attacked Masalit villages, an African ethnic minority, in retaliation for the deaths on Thursday of two of their members.
The violence continued on Wednesday, particularly in El-Geneina, where “intense shooting” caused panic, said in a press release Adam Regal, spokesman for the NGO. Calling the situation “very dangerous”, he warned of “a humanitarian catastrophe with unimaginable consequences”.
The heaviest toll was recorded on Sunday with “201 dead and 13 injured”, according to West Darfur Governor Khamis Abkar in a video released on Tuesday, accusing government forces of having “withdrawn without any justification” from Krink while as the fighting intensified.
Krink “has been completely destroyed, including government institutions,” Mr. Abkar lamented, denouncing “a crime against humanity. »
The NGO Médecins Sans Frontières said that hospitals had been attacked and several members of the medical staff killed.
Consternation
In Geneva, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, expressed her dismay at the violence in Darfur on Wednesday, while the Security Council met urgently behind closed doors, at the request of the United Kingdom, Albania, France, Ireland, Norway and the United States.
However, no text condemning the killings was published at the end of this session. Discussions are continuing, an ambassador said on condition of anonymity.
“I call on the Sudanese authorities to carry out prompt, full, impartial and independent investigations into these attacks and to hold all those responsible to account,” said Mr.me Bachelet.
Witnesses accused the Janjawid militia, a proxy force for the Sudanese government, of orchestrating the violence.
These militiamen, used by dictator Omar al-Bashir in his long war launched in 2003 in Darfur, have in recent years joined the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) by the thousands, led by General Mohammed Hamdane Daglo, number two in military power. in place since the October putsch in Khartoum.
Since the start of the violence, more and more voices have been raised in Darfur calling on the UN to protect civilians.
On Tuesday, the Bar Association of Darfur said that the UN Security Council must be “used to end human rights violations, as well as the arbitrary killings of women and children and the forced displacements” in the region.
“International Protection”
Dignitaries from the Massalit tribe on Wednesday called on the UN Security Council to place their villages under “international protection”.
According to a diplomat in New York, speaking on condition of anonymity, however, no “specific discussion on this point” took place between the 15 members of the Security Council.
According to the United Nations, dozens of people have been killed and hundreds of houses burnt down during several episodes of violence in Darfur in recent months, favored, according to experts, by the security vacuum created by the coup of General Abdel Fattah al- Burhane in Khartoum on October 25.
Clashes between Arab herders and African farmers over territorial disputes or access to water had caused the death of nearly 250 people from October to December in Darfur, according to a union of pro-democracy doctors.
The region was ravaged by a civil war that began in 2003 between the Arab-majority regime and insurgents from ethnic minorities denouncing discrimination. About 300,000 people died and nearly 2.5 million displaced during the first years of violence, according to the UN.
Sudan, which emerged in 2019 from 30 years of dictatorship under Omar al-Bashir, has remained mired in a political and economic slump since the October coup.