Sudan Events – Abdel Basset Idris
Before his liquidation, the world heard the voice of the governor of West Darfur, Khamis Abkar, saying that the Rapid Support RSF Militia had committed genocide against his people, the Masalit, but the militia quickly assassinated him in a hideous manner and threw his body in the open, where passersby and mercenaries threw stones at it, in an attempt to take revenge and assassinate the truth of its crime against civilians.
Details of the assassination:
On the same days last year, Khamis Abkar was gathering his strength and catching his breath while talking on a satellite phone to a satellite channel.
Information indicated that he was involved before his heinous assassination in a meeting with the SAF commanders in his state. Khamis’s concern was to defend the citizens of Geneina, particularly the Masalit, from the repeated attacks by the Rapid Support RSF Militia.
Khamis said that the city streets were full of corpses due to the shooting by the Rapid Support Militia, which committed genocide against his Masalit people, before his meeting with the army. Multiple accounts were circulated about the location of Khamis Abkar before his assassination, including one that indicates that he was at the headquarters of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and another account that says that he was at the governor’s house in the city of Geneina, which is the closest to the truth, when a force from the militia that was searching for him raided it.
Governor Khamis paid the price with his life for three attitudes s. The first was that the relation between him and Hemedti was not good, after he refused to enter the Janjaweed house of obedience and put his forces and rifles at the disposal of Hemeti, where the latter’s attempts to do so failed since the Juba negotiations between the transitional government and the armed movements in the Darfur region, but the governor’s independence and his insistence on tightening his security grip provoked Hemeti, so he visited Geneina, rejecting the ranks that were on the shoulders of the generals of Khamis Abkar’s movement, and said that day, “Brothers, this story does not work this way. We will come and sit in Geneina,” expressing his resentment at naming the area Dar Masalit, calling on this tribe with a historical presence to accept coexistence with others.
As for the second position, Khamis Abkar and his movement rejected the last chance call that Hemeti addressed to him to join his forces in the war and immediately hand over the state to the commander of the Rapid Support Forces RSF in West Darfur, and the third position was represented in his exposure to the world of the campaigns of genocide, ethnic cleansing and forced displacement that the Masalit are being subjected to by the Rapid Support Forces RSF militia. Accusation fingers:
Fingers of accusation pointed to the militia leader in West Darfur, Jumaa Barakallah, for being behind the kidnapping of the governor Khamis Abkar and the deputy governor at the time, Karshom.
Jumaa appeared in a video with Khamis after he was taken out of the car and they entered the militia headquarters together. It was reported that Jumaa had received direct orders from Hemeti and Abdel Rahim to assassinate and liquidate Khamis Abkar, which is what actually happened.
The incident was filmed on video by militia soldiers themselves, showing the governor’s body full of bullet holes that filled his body.
In another video, Khamis Abkar’s body was tied behind a four-wheel drive vehicle, “Toucher ,” belonging to the militia, dragging it through the streets of Geneina.
Then, in a third video, in a scenario similar to “the body after the slaughter,” they threw Abkar’s body out in the open and the mercenaries took turns throwing stones at him while he was a lifeless body that did not receive a dignified burial.
Wide condemnations:
The brutal killing of Khamis Abkar was condemned by the Sovereignty Council TSC , and the SAF accused Hemeti’s militia of assassinating Governor Khamis Abkar.
The national political powers and social figures in the Darfur region also condemned the assassination incident, and the Masalit Chieftain accused Hemeti’s militia of assassinating the governor and committing genocide in Geneina, Karang and other villages in West Darfur.
Evidence before the Criminal Court: Human rights components and human rights defenders in Darfur submitted to the International Criminal Court documented files proving that Hemeti’s militia committed genocide and liquidated the governor Khamis Abkar.
The prosecutor of the Criminal Court visited Chad and heard many testimonies from victims and survivors of the genocide and ethnic cleansing that the Masalit were subjected to by Hemeti’s militia.
Despite the evidence and the willingness of stakeholders to testify and despite the reports of the Security Council’s expert committee and the Human Rights Watch report, which confirmed that the militia committed genocide and assassinated the governor, the case of Khamis Abkar and the genocide of 15,000 and the displacement of about 300,000 Masalit remains locked in the drawers of the prosecutor of the Criminal Court, Karim Khan.
