Friday, November 17, 2023

@NO MASTERS! NO SLAVES!@
‘They called me a slave’: Witness testimony exposes alleged RSF-led campaign to enslave men and women in Sudan

NIMA ELBAGIR, BARBARA ARVANITIDIS, ALEX PLATT, TAMARA QIBLAWI AND PALLABI MUNSI, CNN
November 16, 2023

Mahdi, 16, was blindfolded when a strange man felt for his biceps. He was looking for a “strong” boy to use as a farmhand.

The size of his muscles helped the man determine Mahdi’s price as he bought him from a militiaman who had captured him in the West Darfur capital of El Geneina.

“They hit me and called me a slave. And they kept hitting me,” Mahdi said of his captors and other unknown men. “I’d crouch down and they’d smack me in the neck.”

His harrowing testimony was among dozens – including accounts from women who alleged sexual enslavement – collected as part of an exclusive documentary by CNN about the humanitarian toll exacted by the ongoing fight between Sudan’s ruling military and the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The documentary, which will air this Sunday on “The Whole Story with Anderson Cooper,” exposes an RSF-led campaign to enslave men and women in El Geneina, the largest city controlled by the paramilitary group in Sudan’s Darfur region.

Sudanese women who fled the conflict in El Geneina, in Sudan's Darfur region, line up to receive rice portions from Red Cross volunteers in Ourang on the outskirts of Adre, Chad, on July 25, 2023. - Zohra Bensemra/Reuters

A CNN team in the Chadian refugee camp of Adre, across the border from El Geneina, spoke to over a dozen witnesses who described the abduction of people en masse, with women forced to perform sexual acts in exchange for food and water and both men and women being traded by their captors. Their accounts shed further light on the violence in the genocide-scarred western Sudanese region over the past five months.

To protect the witnesses and survivors, CNN is not identifying them by their real names.

The apparent atrocities peaked after the RSF — which a CNN investigation has shown is backed by Russian mercenary group Wagner — captured El Geneina in mid-June. In the days that followed, a man named Khalid said he saw RSF-uniformed fighters escorting over a dozen shackled women into the El Geneina Industrial School, where he worked as a teacher.

“They flogged them with whips that they use on animals while the girls were screaming,” said Khalid, who told CNN he watched the scene unfold from his hiding place behind a pile of chopped wood in the school compound.

He only came out of hiding when night fell. Throughout the day, he said, he saw the fighters forcing women into classrooms at gunpoint, after which he said he heard sounds that indicated torture and rape.

Many of the women, Khalid said, appeared to have been trafficked from further north in Sudan — where women’s style of dress can display relative affluence, and where the tribal and racial mix is typified by generally lighter complexions.

Several Sudan-based rights groups, including the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) and the government’s Combating Violence Against Women Unit, have told CNN that they believe the RSF abducted dozens of women from the capital, Khartoum, trafficking them to the paramilitary group’s strongholds in Darfur.

Survivors of enslavement and assault in El Geneina spoke about repeated sexual and racial abuse at the hands of the Rapid Support Forces and their Arab allied militia fighters. - Alex Platt/CNN

Rights group activists say they have spoken to scores of local sources who said the women appeared to have been sexually exploited by the RSF. In Adre, CNN spoke to four other witnesses, in addition to Khalid, who said they saw evidence of RSF trafficking women from northern Sudan.

One former abductee from Darfur— who CNN is not naming — said she saw a 4x4 vehicle roll up into an Arab neighborhood in El Geneina, carrying four women who appeared to be northern Sudanese women in the back.

She said she saw an RSF fighter approach the driver and ask how much he was willing to “sell” the women for.

She recalled hearing the driver boast that he had “handpicked the women” and that “no amount of cash” would make him release them to the RSF fighter.

‘To us you are all slaves’

The trafficking of women from Arab-majority areas in the north of the country has become a widely discussed practice in Sudan, with widespread reports of RSF fighters demanding ransoms for their release.

In Darfur, captured women from non-Arab tribes appear to have been treated differently — the apparent sexual exploitation of women tends to involve shorter periods of captivity, and their abuse is reported by dozens of witnesses, survivors and activists to be racially fuelled.

The RSF, a largely Arab fighting force that has been accused of ethnically cleansing non-Arab tribes in Darfur, is widely named as the culprit of wide-scale sexual exploitation there.


The RSF has not responded to CNN’s request for comment about allegations of sexual enslavement.

The paramilitary group has previously denied allegations of conducting an ethnic cleansing campaign and committing sexual violence, in Darfur.

According to a Human Rights Watch report published in August, the RSF raped “several dozen women and girls” in El Geneina between late April and late June.

Mahdi, 16, said he was sold as a farmhand after he was kidnapped along with his brother, who was later shot dead. - Alex Platt/CNN

“The assailants appear to have targeted people because of their Masalit ethnicity and, in some cases, because they were known activists,” the report said.

Several former Darfuri abductees told CNN that fighters from the RSF and their Arab militia allies hurled racist abuse at them during their captivity. One 22-year-old woman named Raghm said she was kidnapped by an RSF-uniformed fighter from her home and detained in a brothel.

She said she heard her captor receiving money in exchange for her enslavement in the brothel — up to 7,000 Sudanese pounds, the equivalent of $10.

“He said to me: ‘To us you all are slaves. To us you are not free,’” said Raghm, who belongs to the Masalit tribe, the main target of the RSF’s revived apparent ethnic cleansing campaign.

Between beatings, she said she recalled him saying: “You are dirt. You are a disgrace.”

In Arabic, the word for ‘slave’ is a racial slur equivalent to the n-word.
‘They flogged us with whips’

Another woman told CNN she and the female members of her family were raped in captivity for four days.

“They locked my mother, myself, and my sisters up for four days and they raped us,” said 20-year-old Hawa. “On the fifth day, we fled. We saw some of (the Arab militia) on the street and they flogged us with whips. They told us to run for our lives, and cursed us, calling us donkeys and goats.

“The children were exhausted, barely walking a few steps before they collapsed,” she said.

Rapid Support Forces leader General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo speaks during a press conference at the Rapid Support Forces headquarters in Khartoum, Sudan, on February 19, 2023. - Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah/Reuters

CNN also found evidence of the enslavement of males as part of the attack on El Geneina.

Mahdi, the 16-year-old boy, told CNN he was kidnapped by the RSF with his brother and that he heard RSF fighters negotiating his “price” to work as a farmhand. He listened to the back-and-forth between his captors and other men while he was blindfolded, his hand and feet bound by rope.

They felt his biceps because they said they “wanted a strong one,” he told CNN.

He said he spent 10 days in the house that he was sold to before escaping and making it to the relative safety of Chad. The brother who was taken at the same time as him was killed by the RSF, he said.

The documentary to be aired Sunday is the latest in a series of CNN investigations into atrocities committed by the RSF in Sudan.

In recent months, CNN has uncovered how the Russian mercenary group Wagner has backed the RSF throughout this war, as well as evidence of arbitrary executions, wholesale destruction of homes, and forced displacement of Sudanese civilians.

Editor’s Note: This report would not have been possible without the contributions of Sudanese journalists whom we are not naming for their safety.

Disturbing videos emerge showing atrocities against African ethnic groups in Darfur

SARAH DEAN, ALLEGRA GOODWIN AND DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN
November 16, 2023 at 4:20 PM


Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah/Reuters


Members of African ethnic groups in Sudan’s Darfur region appear to have been rounded up by members of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and other Arab militias, according to videos and images verified and geolocated by CNN.

The videos emerged over the past two weeks. In one of them shared online and geolocated to Ardamata, an outlying district in El Geneina city in West Darfur state, racist slurs can be heard as men in fatigues refer to the captives as “dogs” and tell them to “gather here”.

In another cut of the video, the same men in fatigues can be seen whipping the men. At one point the men appear to be forced to run down the street. A man fires shots.

In another video, filmed less than a five-minute drive from the first video, the RSF logo appears visible on the uniforms of some of the men dressed in light colored fatigues who appear to be controlling the men huddled together on the ground. The word “liquidation” is mentioned and the words “slay them.”

The RSF on November 4 announced it had taken over the main army base in El Geneina (the 15th division headquarters), close to where these videos were filmed.

A Reuters reporter spoke to three men fleeing from Darfur into Chad on November 7 who said they had witnessed killings by Arab militias and RSF forces targeting the Masalit ethnic group in Ardamata, the news agency reported.

“Sickening reports and images coming from Ardamata, West Darfur, inc [sic] of assassinations, grave violations and massacres of civilians, following RSF takeover of area. Those with authority must uphold international humanitarian law, protect civilians, ensure rule of law and provide unfettered humanitarian access to vulnerable persons,” the UN’s deputy humanitarian coordinator in Sudan, Toby Harward, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

In another video that circulated on Tuesday, over a dozen bodies are piled together in what appears to be a mass grave. Three men inside the ditch throw sand on the bodies in an apparently half-hearted attempt to bury them. A voice from behind the camera barks orders at them.

It is unclear where the video was filmed, but one of the men helping bury the dead says he is from El Geneina. Halfway through the video, a man sits up from among the bodies, the dust falling off his face.

“Hey! That guy’s alive,” shouts a voice from behind the camera. “Kill him,” shouts another man shortly before the video ends.

CNN does not know the fate of the men concerned. It’s also unclear whether the men filmed in the ditch are the same men as those seen in the video running from RSF soldiers and militia loyal to the RSF.

The RSF has denied that “any incidents of ethnic cleansing or tribal conflict took place in the Ardmetta [Ardamata] area of El Geneina, West Darfur State.”

In a statement responding to questions from CNN last Wednesday, the RSF said it does not target civilians and that its forces are “fighting side-by-side with the people of Sudan to restore our country to its rightful path of civilian-led democratic rule.”

The paramilitary group said, however, that as a result of the conflict between RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) in the Ardamata neighborhood, their actions “did unfortunately result in the displacement of civilians” as the military zone is located amid residential areas.

“The conflict ended with our forces seizing control of the SAF 15th Infantry Division and liberating the division headquarters,” the statement said, adding that “since the division was liberated, Ardmetta has seen no further acts of aggression or armed conflict. Residents have returned to their homes, and security has stabilized, allowing life to resume as normal.”
New surge in killings

Amid the most significant increase in displacement in months, aid agencies operating in Chad say arrivals from Sudan have been describing a new surge in killings and fighting in West Darfur.

Ethnic-related killings have intensified since fighting broke out mid-April between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the RSF, according to witnesses and aid groups operating in the region.

In September, the United Nations’ human rights body (UNJHRO) said it had received reports of at least 13 mass graves in El Geneina believed to contain civilians from the ethnic Masalit tribe who were allegedly killed in attacks by the RSF and allied Arab militias.


Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said Tuesday that, following increased fighting in El Geneina, its teams working across the border in eastern Chad have seen an “immediate and major increase in the number of people arriving in the region.”

“Our people there in Ardamata were killed and displaced. Children are slaughtered, women’s money and belongings are robbed, and they can’t escape,” one Sudanese woman, Nabila Abdel Rahman, told Reuters on Tuesday.

In neighboring South Sudan, the UN’s humanitarian agency (OCHA) said there has also been a “significant increase in Sudanese refugees in the past few days.”

MSF said a 27-year-old man had told staff at its hospital in Adré, Chad, that he fled El Geneina with 16 other people, but their group was attacked on the road to Chad. He said the attackers killed everyone, but he survived by playing dead.

“Eventually a new group of refugees arrived and helped him reach the border. He has multiple bullet wounds on his hands and legs,” the MSF news release said.
A pattern of abuse

The incidents described to aid agencies follow a pattern of similar alleged abuses by the RSF since the conflict began, according to multiple CNN reports.

“In the first three days of November, we have seen more new arrivals of Sudanese refugees than during the whole previous month; about 7,000 people crossed the border,” MSF outreach coordinator, Stephanie Hoffmann, said.

UN refugee agency (UNHCR) director of external relations Dominique Hyde said she witnessed a surge in human suffering when she visited Sudan last week.

In the Darfur region, fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and RSF has caused even more displacement with thousands struggling to find shelter and many sleeping under trees by the roadside, a UNCHR news release said.

“Child malnutrition is rampant, women are being raped, violence prevails and entire families are sleeping outside with no roof over their heads,” Hyde wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Since the war in Sudan broke out in April, 4.5 million people have been internally displaced and an estimated 1.2 million have fled to neighbouring countries, according to UNHCR.

On November 7, the US State Department announced that during talks in Jeddah, the SAF and RSF “committed to take steps to facilitate increased humanitarian assistance, and to implement confidence-building measures.”

They were unable to agree on a ceasefire implementation.

“The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, IGAD, also on behalf of the African Union, and the United States call upon the SAF and RSF to put the Sudanese people first, silence the guns, and seek a negotiated end to this needless war,” a joint statement from the talks released by the State Department said.

They came after US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken called for an “immediate cessation of attacks” in El Fasher in North Darfur.

“The United States is deeply troubled by reports of an imminent large-scale attack by Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on El Fasher, North Darfur, that would subject civilians, including hundreds of thousands of displaced persons – many of whom only recently fled to El Fasher from other areas – to extreme danger,” Blinken said in a press statement on November 2.

CNN’s Sarah Dean and David McKenzie reported from South Africa and Allegra Goodwin from London.



No comments:

Post a Comment