North Darfur: Razing of Villages in Rural Areas of El Fasher

Agencies

Throughout April, the protection context in and around El Fasher city has continued to deteriorate with frequent armed clashes, aerial bombardments and resulting rounds of displacement. In a gravely concerning sign of the shape that further escalation of hostilities may take, armed elements attacked over a dozen villages to the west of El Fasher over 12 – 15 April. The affected villages are predominately within the administrative units of Sarafaya, Birka and Korma, with reports indicating that at least 16 villages were affected. Reports indicate that the attacks on the villages caused the deaths of at least 29 civilians, and were characterized by indiscriminate violence, including sexual violence, looting of personal belongings from houses as well as market areas, razing of residential and commercial structures, rustling of livestock and crop destruction. Households displaced from affected villages were typically forced to flee with nothing to sustain themselves. A proportion of those displaced in these attacks were previously displaced from IDP camps in El Fasher in earlier stages of the conflict. As households fled affected villages, family separation occurred in a number of cases resulting in reports of separated and missing children. Community based protection structures have mobilized to support the reunification of children with their caregivers but the dysfunctionality of the communications networks is hampering their efforts. Displacement from the affected villages has driven thousands of households towards the villages of Shagra and Golo, Zamzam IDP camp and gathering sites in El Fasher city. In Shagra and Golo, displaced households are reportedly sheltering in multiple large displacement sites in the open, lacking access to food, water and shelter. In some cases, survivors of sexual violence have received assistance to access services at hospital in El Fasher city; however, efforts to identify and provide support to all those who need it are still ongoing. Gathering sites for newly displaced households in Zamzam IDP camp and throughout the southern neighborhoods of El Fasher city were already severely overcrowded before this most recent influx, exacerbating protection risks for already vulnerable displaced populations, and restrictions on movement on key roads out of El Fasher are inhibiting civilians from fleeing to safer areas. In parallel, prices for water and fuel are skyrocketing, placing these basic essentials beyond the reach of much of the civilian population remaining in the city.
The tragic development of the military and humanitarian situation in Sudan arouses deep concern of the Joint AU/IGAD High-Level Panel. The escalation of confrontations between The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the areas of El Fasher, in North Darfur and Kordofan, in Babanoussa, constitutes a real threat to the security of civilian populations in these two localities as elsewhere in The Sudan. The attacks by the RSF on the town of El Fasher, where camps shelter thousands of Displaced persons, carries the risk of huge civilian deaths, and violation of International Humanitarian and Human Rights Laws.