‘Hallmarks of genocide’ found in El Fasher, UN Sudan probe says on RSF actions

By Burak Bir

LONDON (AA) — Actions carried out by Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) during their late-October takeover of El Fasher show “hallmarks of genocide” and indicate an ongoing risk of further atrocities, UN investigators said in a report released Thursday.

The International Independent Investigation Mission on Sudan said the RSF committed acts displaying “hallmarks of genocide” against the Zaghawa and Fur communities, warning that the pattern of violence signals a continued threat to civilians.

The mission said evidence establishes that at least three underlying acts of genocide were committed: “killing members of a protected ethnic group,” “causing serious bodily and mental harm,” and “deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction in whole or in part.”

“The scale, coordination, and public endorsement of the operation by senior RSF leadership demonstrate that the crimes committed in and around El Fasher were not random excesses of war,” Mohamed Chande Othman, chair of the mission, said.

He added: “They formed part of a planned and organized operation that bears the defining characteristics of genocide.”

The report said an 18-month siege of El Fasher “deliberately imposed conditions of life” through the deprivation of food, water, medical care and humanitarian assistance.

It described the siege and RSF actions as a “pattern of identity-based targeting linked to ethnicity, gender and perceived political affiliation.”

The mission also documented allegations of mass killings, widespread rape and other sexual violence, arbitrary detention, torture and cruel treatment, extortion and enforced disappearances.

Genocidal intent, the mission said, was “the only reasonable inference” from the RSF’s “systematic pattern of ethnically targeted killings, sexual violence, destruction, and public statements explicitly calling for the elimination of non-Arab communities.”