SUDAN and SANTA MONICA – In the dead of night, the 20 year-old girl hides beneath a blanket as trucks full of soldiers roll by on the streets outside. Gunshots shatter the stillness. There is a moment of quiet until the wailing begins. Shrieks of grief that mourn the death of another loved one. A friend. Or an innocent that has died at the hands of either the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) or the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF).
A report recently published by Human Rights Watch (HRW), accuses both military organizations of “committing crimes against humanity.”
Since the war started over a year ago, one in three of those wounded have been women or children under the age of 10, said Christos Cristou, international President of Doctors Without Borders. The girl hiding beneath the blankets sleeps with a knife in her hand because she is afraid what the RSF will do.
“I have slept with a knife under my pillow for months in fear from the raids that lead to rape by RSF,” the 20 year-old woman living in an area controlled by the RSF told Human Rights Watch in early 2024. “Since this war started, it is not safe anymore to be a woman living in Khartoum under RSF.”
“The Rapid Support Forces have raped, gang raped, and forced into marriage countless women and girls in residential areas in Sudan’s capital,” said Laetitia Bader, deputy Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “The armed group has terrorized women and girls and both warring parties have blocked them from getting aid and support services, compounding the harm they face and leaving them to feel that nowhere is safe.”
The report also said that men and boys have also been raped during the war.
The current war in Sudan began in April of 2023 after 30 years of dictatorial control of the country by Omar al-Bashir. Al-Bashir lost power in 2019 when the RSF and the SAF overthrew his government. The RSF and the SAF have been steadily escalating the conflict with one another until full-blown Civil War broke out in April 2023.
Some reference content provided by France24, Human Rights Watch, Reuters, and The Council on Foreign Affairs, Google Images, Zohra Bensemra, YouTube and DW.
