Reports of mass killings in el-Fasher in Darfur have echoes of country’s dark past

Evidence emerging from systematic killings in the Sudanese city of El Fasher has led human rights and relief activists to describe the civil war between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the army as a “continuation of the genocide in Darfur.”

The fall of El Fasher, in the Darfur region, after an 18-month siege by the RSF, brings together the country’s different layers of conflict – with echoes of its dark past and the brutality of its current war.

The RSF emerged from the Arab Janjaweed militias that massacred hundreds of thousands of Darfur’s non-Arab population in the early 2000s.

The paramilitary force has been accused of ethnic killings since its power struggle with the army erupted into violence in April 2023. The RSF leadership has consistently denied the accusations – although its leader on Wednesday… Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo admits to committing “violations” In El Fasher.

The current accusations are based on clear evidence of atrocities provided by RSF fighters themselves.

They have shared horrific videos showing summary executions of mostly male civilians and former combatants, celebrating over corpses, and taunting and assaulting people.

Accounts of exhausted survivors also paint a picture of terror and violence.

One of the men told BBC Arabic, “The situation in El Fasher is very tragic, and there are violations on the roads, including looting and shooting, without distinction between minors and majors.” He had fled to the town of Tawila, a center for displaced people from El Fasher.

Another woman, Ikram Abdel Hamid, told Reuters news agency that Rapid Support Forces soldiers separated the fleeing civilians at a dirt barrier around the city and shot the men.

and Satellite images collected by Yale University’s Human Research Laboratory Evidence of what appear to be massacre sites appears – clusters of bodies and red spots on the ground that analysts believe may be bloodstains.

Yale University researchers say in their report that El Fasher “appears to be witnessing a systematic and deliberate process of ethnic cleansing of non-Arab indigenous communities through forced displacement and summary executions.”

There is a clear ethnic element to the battle for El Fasher, because local armed groups from the dominant Zaghawa tribe, known as the Joint Force, are fighting alongside the army.

RSF fighters view Zaghawa civilians as legitimate targets.

That’s what several survivors of the paramilitary takeover of the Zamzam camp for displaced people next to El Fasher reported earlier this year, according to an investigation by medical charity Doctors Without Borders.

The army has also been accused of targeting ethnic groups it views as support bases for the RSF in areas it has regained control, including Sennar and Gezira states and some parts of North Kordofan.

“Whether you are a civilian, wherever you are, it is not safe now, even in Khartoum,” says Amy Mahmoud, strategic director of the Humanitarian Network for Internally Displaced Persons, which helps coordinate aid deliveries in Darfur.

“Because with just a click, people in power with guns can and will continue to falsely imprison, disappear, kill and torture everyone.”

Both sides have been accused of war crimes, and ethnically motivated revenge attacks are part of that.

It was the Sudanese military government in 2003 that used ethnicity as a weapon – recruiting the Janjaweed to put down a rebellion by black African groups in Darfur, which accused Khartoum of marginalizing them politically and economically.

Kate Ferguson, co-founder of the NGO Protection Approach, says: The pattern of violence that prevailed then is being repeated in Darfur now.

This was most evident in the 2023 massacre of members of the Masalit tribe in El Geneina, West Darfur, which the United Nations says killed up to 15,000 people.

“For more than two years, the RSF has followed a very clear, practiced and expected pattern,” Ms Ferguson told a news conference.

“They first encircle the targeted town or city, then weaken it by cutting off access to food, medicine, energy supplies, and the Internet. Then when they are weakened, they overwhelm the population with arson, sexual violence, massacres, and destruction of critical infrastructure. This is a deliberate strategy of destruction and displacement, which is why I feel the appropriate word is genocide.”

The RSF denied involvement in what it called “tribal conflicts,” but General Dagalo, widely known as Hemedti, appears to have heard expressions of growing international outrage, including from the United Nations, the African Union, the European Union and the United Kingdom.

He published a video clip in which he said that he regretted the disaster that befell the people of El Fasher in a war “imposed on us.” He acknowledged the existence of violations by his forces, and promised to investigate them by a committee that has now arrived in the city.

Any “soldier or any officer who commits a crime or crosses the lines against any person… shall be immediately arrested and the consequences thereof [of the investigation] It will be announced immediately and publicly to everyone.”

However, observers say similar promises made in the past – in response to accusations of a massacre in the Darfuri town of El Geneina in 2023, and alleged atrocities during the group’s control of Central Gezira State – have not been fulfilled.

It is also not clear how much control the RSF leadership has over its soldiers, a loose mix of hired militias, allied Arab groups, and regional mercenaries, many of them from Chad and South Sudan.

“The truth is that it is very difficult to believe the way the RSF is doing it, where Hemedti will issue the order, and then people on the ground will follow,” says aid coordinator Ms. Mahmoud. “By then, we will have lost many, many people.”

Aid groups and activists warn that if the pattern of the past two years is allowed to continue, it could happen again. They assert that the killings in El Fasher were completely expected, but the international community failed to act to protect civilians despite adequate warnings.

“The fact is that we have raised these options several times during six meetings with elements of the UN Security Council, with the American government, with the British government, with the French government, basically saying that they have to be prepared for the kinetic protection option.” [direct military action] “In the summer of last year,” says Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of the Yale Human Research Laboratory.

“This cannot be settled with a press conference. It must be settled with immediate action.”

In particular, activists are urging pressure on the United Arab Emirates, which is widely accused of providing military support to the Rapid Support Forces. The UAE denies this despite the evidence provided by United Nations reports and international media investigations.

“This is exactly like the Siege of Sarajevo,” says Ms. Mahmoud, referring to the Srebrenica massacre during the Bosnian War, which spurred international action. “This is the Srebrenica moment.”