‘All Because We Are Black’: Asma, Refugee from Sudan, Describes Blue Nile Conflict
“We left our homes with not even a cup like this one,” said Asma, gesturing toward a red plastic cup lying on the dirt ground next to her foot. Sitting on the trunk of a felled tree crowded on all sides by young children in this refugee camp on the border of Sudan, Asma recounted when fighting broke out in her village in Blue Nile state. Her story is part of a series produced from an Enough trip to the Sherkole refugee camp in Ethiopia ...
Sudan Dispatch: Government Forces Target Civilians in Blue Nile, Refugees Say
“I saw bodies all the way from Damazine to Ethiopia,” said Kasmero, who was in the Blue Nile state capital of Damazine when fighting broke out in early September. “When you run, you don’t go through the main roads,” he explained. Sudanese government forces and militias are killing and raping civilians in the Sudanese border state of Blue Nile, according to accounts from refugees who recently fled the fighting. Alarming new details about how the war in Blue Nile is being conducted emerged from an Enough Project trip to the Ethiopian border—where nearly 29,000 Sudanese refugees have sought safety ...
Field Dispatch: Refugees from Blue Nile Recount Atrocities, Government’s Targeting of Civilians
After a trip to the Ethiopian border, Enough Project researchers Amanda Hsiao and Omer Ismail report that Sudanese government forces and militias are killing and raping civilians in Blue Nile state, according to refugees who recently fled the fighting ...
Sudan Army Misses Deadline to Withdraw from Abyei
Sudanese government troops remain in the disputed border region of Abyei, in contempt of a deadline agreed to by northern and southern officials that all troops would withdraw from the area by last Friday. In public remarks, Sudanese officials have been intransigent—and misleading—about why the deadline was not met ...
Access to Abyei, Displaced Residents Continuously Threatened
Abyei should remain accessible to humanitarians operating from both Sudan and South Sudan, the U.N. humanitarian coordination office, or OCHA, and former southern minister Luka Biong Deng said recently. An estimated 110,000 people remain displaced from Abyei and are scattered in locations to the south of the area. Humanitarian agencies responding to the needs of the displaced population have been largely operating in South Sudan, where the new government in Juba has control ...
Sudan Army’s Withdrawal from Abyei Behind Schedule
Sudan government troops have yet to comply with the first phase of a withdrawal schedule aimed at demilitarizing the disputed Abyei area that sits between Sudan and South Sudan. According to the timeline, signed by Sudanese and South Sudanese government officials two weeks ago, the northern Sudan Armed Forces, or SAF, should have withdrawn out of Abyei town by the end of last week. Southern and U.N. sources say that SAF remain in Abyei town ...
Opposition Leader: ‘Change is Inevitable’ in Sudan
As violence continues in Blue Nile and South Kordofan, the leader of the group fighting Sudanese government forces in the two border states called for a “holistic, integrated approach” to Sudan’s multiple conflicts. “It’s not about Nuba Mountains, it’s not about Darfur, it’s not about Blue Nile,” said Yasir Arman, the secretary general of the SPLM-N, the political arm of the opposition group, told Enough in a phone interview. “It’s about democracy and transformation. The issue is about how Sudan is going to be ruled.” ...
U.S. Statement Credits Sudan Government for Non-existent Ceasefire
In a statement issued yesterday on the ongoing conflict in South Kordofan, the U.S. State Department revealed itself to be behind the curve on developments on the ground in Sudan. The press statement praised Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir’s ceasefire announcement on Tuesday as a “positive initial step” and urged the opposing Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, or SPLM-N, “to show the same leadership and declare a two-week ceasefire as well.” The statement appears to be either uninformed or intentionally dismissive of the fact that the government has continued to bomb areas in the Nuba Mountains since the declaration ...
5 Stories You Might Have Missed This Week
A weekly round-up of must-read stories, posted every Friday ...
South Kordofan Conflict Continues as U.N. Calls for Human Rights Investigations
Over two months since the conflagration in the Sudanese border state of South Kordofan broke out, violence continues to persist, and the warring parties have not re-opened dialogue. Despite findings by the United Nations report that suggest war crimes and crimes against humanity have been committed in the conflict, the international response has moved little beyond rhetoric ...
