WARNING: Graphic Images
“‘Neighbourhoods and homes were continuously attacked, looted, burned and destroyed,’ especially those where Masalit and other African communities lived, and their people were harassed, assaulted, sexually abused, and at times, executed [1A].”
The United Nations confirms that rape is being used as a weapon against women and girls in the Sudanese civil war [1B][2A].
NGOs describe rape as an everyday occurrence, with both warring parties participating, and numbers estimated as high as 4,400 during this latest conflict [2B]. But civil war has been ongoing in Sudan (in three stages) since 1955, and rape has been employed from the outset [3].
“…systemic rape in homes, detention facilities, public checkpoints, and interrogation centres…committed mainly by members of the police force, intelligence officers, interrogators and prison guards…[including] forced nudity, [punitive] virginity test, and sexual torture [4A].”
This tactic is not new. We have seen it used in Iraq; Rwanda; Syria, Egypt, Libya, and elsewhere in the Middle East during the Arab Spring; in India; and most recently against Israel [4B][5][6][7A][8][9]. In Rwanda, between 100,000 and 250,000 women were raped during the three months of genocide. Continue reading
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