Sudan air strike causes ‘horrific massacre’ in Darfur market
Sudan’s military has been accused of carrying out an air strike on a marketplace in the western region of Darfur in which more than 100 people were reportedly killed.
The Emergency Lawyers rights group described the bombing in Kabkabiya town on Monday, the weekly market day, as a “horrific massacre”.
Clashes have intensified in different parts of Sudan in recent weeks between the army and its former ally, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
Both sides deny carrying out war crimes during their 19-month power struggle that has caused the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis and forced more than 11 million people from their homes.
According to Emergency Lawyers, the air strike happened as residents from nearby villages came to shop in Kabkabiya, about 180km (112 miles) west of el-Fasher, the only city still under military control in Darfur and which has been under siege since April.
“This attack on civilians on market day is a flagrant violation of international law,” said Emergency Lawyers, adding that hundreds of people had also been injured in the air strike.
The group has also condemned the RSF for its indiscriminate shelling of Omdurman, the city just across the River Nile from the capital, Khartoum.
Emergency Lawyers said that 14 people had died after a shell hit a bus on Tuesday.
It also condemned the RSF for using civilian infrastructure, such as fuel stations, for military purposes.
On Sunday, an air strike hit a petrol station in an RSF-controlled area of Khartoum, killing at least 28 people.
A volunteer group, the South Belt Emergency Response Room, said that 37 people were also injured.
The army has fighter jets, but it has denied deliberately targeting civilians.
On Tuesday, a military spokesperson said their airstrikes were part of a legitimate exercise to defend the country, adding that the army vowed to continue targeting RSF sites, which it claims are often hidden in residential areas
Campaign group Human Rights Watch (HRW) has appealed to the United Nations and the African Union to urgently deploy troops to Sudan to protect civilians.
In its latest report on atrocities in Sudan, it accuses the RSF and allied Arab militias of killing scores of civilians – and injuring, raping and abducting many others – in waves of attacks in South Kordofan state from December 2023 to March 2024.
The rights group has previously documented similar abuses as part of a campaign of ethnic cleansing in West Darfur.
“The Rapid Support Forces’ abuse of civilians in South Kordofan is emblematic of continuing atrocities across Sudan,” said HRW researcher Jean-Baptiste Gallopin.
“These new findings underscore the urgent need for the deployment of a mission to protect civilians in Sudan.”
In May, US special envoy for Sudan Tom Perriello said that some estimates suggested up to 150,000 people had been killed in the conflict.
—BBC
