By Kazembe Batts IG: @kazbatts
El Fasher, Darfur in the western part of Sudan has been captured by the Rapid Support Forces who are rebelling against the Sudan Armed Forces and challenging the need for a unified Sudan nation.
The city of El Fasher has been encircled by the RSF and they control all access. While the 500-day long siege has lasted it is estimated that 600,000 residents have fled and 250,000 people remain in the city.
The RSF has built a sand barrier encircling the city causing it to have one way in and out. A seeming death trap for people attempting to escape. Internet or telephone service is non-existent, and atrocities are hard to confirm.
Until last week El Fasher was the only area in the Western part of the country controlled by the national government and SAF. With the fall of the city to the RSF the country is practically split into two separate nations. The RSF has already declared the territory they control to be a sovereign nation.
Widely circulating videos online and eyewitness accounts show a horrifying situation of random attacks on people who identify as African as opposed to Arab throughout territory controlled by the RSF. United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said, “There are large scale ethnic attacks and atrocities by the RSF.”
The leader of the RSF, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, is the same man who led the Janjaweed forces that were credibly accused of genocide in Darfur twenty years ago. At that time pan-African Rev. Herbert Daughtry of the House of the Lord Church visited the region and brought back evidence of catastrophic violence against Africans while his team delivered needed supplies.
In a Democracy Now interview from Nairobi, Kenya Sudanese activist Marine Almeel shared “What the Sudanese armed forces have been promising, which is military victory which is gonna end the war, is nowhere near happening and if they keep insisting that they must win with a military victory then this is just gonna prolong the war more and more because both parties are indiscriminately attacking civilians and infrastructure, like hospitals.”
Almeel also added “The U.S. Special Envoy for Sudan said that the main concern is relations between the Sudan Armed Forces and Islamic movements, but I think it is important to move the main concern from any power sharing prospects to what is happening to people now on the ground.”
Speaking truth to power Almeel is recognizing that politics is at the core of the stalemate between the two opposing forces and visions for Sudan.
American diplomats being more concerned with whether Sudan has relations with Islamic forces than stopping the undeniable mass murder, call it genocide if you want, of hundreds of thousands of civilians must change. Donald Trump’s recent trip to the United Arab Emirates, the country accused of arming the RSF, has implications for a future peaceful Sudan.
Did the American president discuss Sudan with President of the United Arab Emirates Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan? UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the USA make up the “Quad” which is supposed to be building peace. Can nations arm one-side and then be a fair negotiator of a peace deal? Since the start of the war in 2023, 12 million have been displace and an estimated 300,000 people killed.
Sudan is big. Sudan is diverse. Sudan has resources. Most importantly right now…the people of Sudan, especially in Darfur and especially in El Fasher are being indiscriminately murdered.
What can I, you, the American government and people do to protect African lives that are really in danger. As opposed to “going in with guns blazing to Nigeria to protect the Christians” when, although there are killings in Northern Nigeria, there is real GENOCIDE in El Fasher.