Growing rise in violations of womens rights in the Sudan
Report: Mashaer Idris
As the war between the army and the Sudans rapid support entered its eighth month, there were numerous violations of women, including abductions, arrests and rapes. There is no precise accounting of these cases, especially since there are many cases in clash areas with difficulty in monitoring and documenting them, as well as the social stigma that makes most families prefer to remain silent and not to detect such violations.
In the context of the rise in violence against women, the member of the Executive Office of the Sudan Doctors Adiba Ibrahim al-Sayed on the rise of rape cases recorded in various medical facilities to 370 since April 15 to date, stressing that 63 new cases of rape were recorded, including children in various hospitals, including 4 in Bashir Hospital, 8 in Omdurman, and 2 in Al Noor Hospital and East Nile Hospital.
Moral disclosure revealed 240 cases of rape in Darfur, 13 new cases in El Fasher, 12 in El Geneina and 15 more in Nyala, confirming that many cases of rape did not reach hospitals for fear of social stigma. It also confirmed that 8 cases of rape of children under the age of 17 had been registered. It acknowledged the challenges facing them at work, including the severe shortage of medicines, especially the Protocol, after its confiscation from Doctors Without Borders (MSF), by failing to name rapists and following up with doctors for 3 months to prevent sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancies.
Moral emphasis was placed on the need to make society aware of the victims family in particular, since rape was a disease that must be cured and the rapist should not be reprimanded as if she had chosen guilt, and solidarity and sympathy should be given to her in order to go beyond psychiatric treatment.
Abortions
For its part, lawyer Enam Atiq revealed that 21 new cases of rape documented by the Public Prosecutors Office had been registered in a civil war, 6 of which had been aborted in accordance with article 135 of the Sudanese Criminal Code of 1991, while the law did not specify the competent authority to grant abortion permission. "After numerous discussions between the group of lawyers, the prosecutor in the civil delegation took over these proceedings."
Steps ahead of the abortion process included bringing in Aronic 8, a pregnancy analysis, a picture of the age of the pregnancy and a report on the survivors general condition. Anam reported that these procedures sometimes take up to 40 days.
Since the outbreak of fighting between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in mid-April, the Sudans Violence against Women and Children Unit (VAW) has reported incidents of conflict-related sexual violence that have caused controversy in political circles because of its clear reference to the involvement of RSF elements in most of the violations documented by the Unit. While reports by international organizations revealed gruesome violations of women and girls, some States in the Sudan have strongly condemned them, accusing RSF and its militias of most of them.
The Director of Sudans Unit for Combating Violence against Women and Children Salimi Isaac (government body) criticized the failure of the State and the international community to fulfil their most basic commitments to the growing needs of Sudanese women with the war, in particular the mechanisms for protection and response to gender-based violence.
In a statement on the occasion of the 16-day campaign against gender-based violence, the Director of the Unit noted the synchronization of the campaign with the dire war in the Sudan and its catastrophic humanitarian impact on civilians, in particular conflict-related sexual violence crimes documented by the Unit and its partners in various parts of the country. The 16-day campaign against gender-based violence lasts from November 25 to December 10.
In this difficult period, women and girls in the Sudan were paying exorbitant bills for war, assuming the responsibilities of the peacemaking and community-building industry, with significant social and economic burdens in their dire need for safe spaces that were not yet available.
With grave violations of women and girls in the Sudan during the war, particularly nationality, the need to strengthen protection mechanisms and responses to gender-based violence throughout the country, as well as to provide for womens and girls basic needs and dignity had increased.
She stressed that the priority of the Sudan Violence against Women and Children Unit during this years 16-day campaign, "Let us all unite to end violence against women and girls", was to highlight the basic needs of women and girls in the Sudan, especially displaced women and girls, in refugee camps in various Bekaa, especially in the border area of Adri in Chad.
Womens Solidarity Conference
In the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Thursday, the meetings of the African Womens Solidarity Conference with the Sudan were concluded to highlight the violence, violations and crimes that occurred during the war between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces.
The Regional Director of the Horn of Africa Womens Network "Shout" Hala al-Karp told a press conference at the conclusion of the conference that it was necessary to conduct dialogues among all women beyond disparities to go forward through a single agenda.
It stressed the need to create womens groups and bodies to talk about reality and monitor the scale of atrocities in order to reach the entire world, as well as to communicate with all actors.
The final communiqué of the African Womens Solidarity Conference with the Sudan called for the establishment of a court to deal with war crimes committed with a focus on violence against women and girls to ensure that gender-based sexual violence cases are brought to justice and seriously addressed in the political process as a core issue, including accounting, transitional justice and reparation.
He called for "international action to stop the flow of illicit funds and economic patterns that contribute to the illicit enrichment of war crimes officials".
It also stressed the need for gender-sensitive protection mechanisms to ensure humanitarian access for survivors and war-affected persons and to ensure that womens voices and demands of civil society are not suppressed and terrorized.
He stressed the need for urgent implementation of the decision of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to investigate atrocities that had taken place during the war, and to consult women-led organizations to support and document violations on the ground.
He appealed to the African Union to take immediate and decisive action, including diplomatic interventions aimed at facilitating the cessation of hostilities and the establishment of a war crimes investigation mission.
He stressed that armed groups should be held responsible for mass violations and that immunity should not be granted as a deal of short-term stability leading to the continuation of bloody conflict.
Women, actors and leadership groups should participate at all stages of the political processes related to conflict resolution and peace in the Sudan, together with sustainable funding for civil society and womens rights organizations working in conflict zones and in the middle of refugee and displaced communities.
Since April 15, the Sudan has been witnessing heavy fighting between the army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which began in the capital and extended to large areas of Darfur and Kordofan. War operations between the parties to the conflict were accompanied by widespread violations of civilians, including killings, arrests and house displacement following their occupation by RSF elements and the conversion of military barracks social stigma that makes most victims silent and undisclosed.
The Rapid Support Forces are accused of rape and conflict-related sexual violence, but their commanders have repeatedly denied involvement in such crimes and accuse the security services and the army of being behind the defamation of their forces.
