Day: January 6, 2023

The 15-year-old daughter of a leading member of the suspended committee for dismantling the former regime was gang-raped by unknown assailants in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, relatives and friend of her family told Sudan Tribune on Friday.

The young girl was abducted from a street in the southern Khartoum suburb of Almaamoura on Friday morning, waiting for transportation to take her to the school for private lessons. She was taken to a house in an unknown destination where she was raped by three men.

The rape survivor was then returned to a site near the Manshiyya bridge. where the perpetrators asked her to inform her father of what had happened before to release her.

During the Bashir regime, rapes and sexual assaults took place in the war-affected areas of the Darfur region, Blue Nile state South Kordofan state. Also, women were raped after arrest for participating in pro-democracy demonstrations before and after the fall of the former regime.

This case is characterized by the fact that it was carried out to avenge her father, who was known for his opposition to the Islamist regime and had been arrested several times.

The incident took place three days before a conference to agree on a new mechanism to dismantle the al-Bashir regime. General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan immediately after the October 25 coup froze the Empowerment Removal Committee, reinstated to the civil service the dismissed partisans of the former regime and restored confiscated assets and properties to the corrupt Islamist individuals and groups.

In December 2021, The United Nations reported that 13 women ad girls were raped by the security services after their arrest for participation in an anti-coup protest.

After the coup, Khartoum and the other regions are witnessing unprecedented insecurity including tribal clashes, looting, robbery, and sexual assaults.

Source: Sudan Tribune

The United Nations humanitarian agency in Ethiopia said that an increased amount of humanitarian aid has continued to arrive in Ethiopia’s Tigray region following the November peace deal.

In its latest report issued on Thursday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) however said malnutrition rates are critical and alarmingly high.

“Between mid-November of last year, following the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement, and the end of December, more than 3,000 trucks carrying food, as well as health, shelter, water and other supplies, have been brought into the region through four road corridors,” said OCHOA.

Sudan Tribune has learnt that during the last week of December alone it assisted 368,000 people in Tigray with some health and nutrition supplies also being sent by air.

“Since mid-November, food has been distributed to more than 2.2 million people,” said the agency’s report.

“However, some areas remain challenging to reach, including some border areas in the north and some areas off the main roads”

According to the latest report, malnutrition rates remain alarmingly high, with one-third of children screened in late December found acutely malnourished and 4 per cent of them severely malnourished.

The Ethiopian government and Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) signed a peace agreement last November, which ended two years of war and claimed the lives of more than half a million people.

The peace deal has led to the lifting of aid and basic services blockades imposed by the government against the Tigray region.

Accordingly, Ethiopian Airlines has resumed passenger flights to Mekelle and Shire cities, and banking services started in the capital Mekelle on 2 January with some having re-opened in other parts of Tigray in December.

Telecommunications services and electricity supply have also been restored in larger parts of the region.

However, full banking services, public transportation and the delivery of commercial supplies have not yet resumed.

According to OCHOA, Humanitarian needs remain extremely high in parts of the neighbouring Afar and Amhara which were affected by the conflict.

“The distribution of food and other assistance continues, although gaps remain including in areas where people are returning to their homes”

Meanwhile, in eastern and southern Ethiopia, communities continue to suffer from the devastating drought which is affecting the Horn of Africa’s region.

As a result, “nearly 12 million people are estimated to be food insecure and more than 8 million people need water sanitation and hygiene assistance” the UN agency cautioned.

Apart from the situation in Northern Ethiopia, an active cholera outbreak also continues in parts of the Oromia and Somali regions.

“The humanitarian response is being scaled up in drought-affected areas, but we need more resources”

While fighting has calmed in Tigray, clashes are being reported in Ethiopia’s southern Oromia region.

Ethiopia’s Oromo and Amhara ethnic groups blame each other for allegedly deadly attacks since November.

According to the UN, delivery of aid to the Oromia region is being hampered due to the ongoing violence in the region which is displacing thousands of civilians.

As of December 30, more than 14,000 people fleeing conflict from Oromia arrived in the neighbouring Amhara region.

Source: Sudan Tribune

The director of Ghadeer locality in South Kordofan suspended the gold mining activities of El Masar Company on Wednesday until further notice after local protests against the company’s continued use of cyanide and mercury. In Talodi locality, a reconciliation document was signed with representatives of the Al Junaid Gold Mining Company.

The director of Ghadeer locality in South Kordofan issued a decision to suspend the gold mining activities of El Masar Company until further notice after protests by resistance committees against the company’s continued use of cyanide and mercury.

The South Kordofan Resistance Committees Coordination welcomed the decision in a press statement. “The vigil of the resistance committees in Ghadeer to protest against the company has been successful as it led to the suspension of its mining activities.”

The committees renewed their “categorical rejection of mining activities that use materials harmful to health and the environment”.

They also said that the company “signed unfair agreements affecting the people of the locality”.

Last month, the grassroots activists accused native administration leaders of signing “an illegal agreement with the El Masar Company, failing to consult the local residents”. They argued that, in particular, local residents must be consulted on the toxic mining waste (called karta in Sudan).

The resistance committees warned that the return of gold mining companies will cause societal and environmental instability in the region.

Reconciliation

Community leaders in Talodi, South Kordofan, and representatives of the Al Junaid Gold Mining Company signed a reconciliation document, also on Wednesday.

Sources reported that the two sides agreed to put aside differences over development issues in Talodi locality through dialogue and agreed on the provision of services and compensation for those who were affected during violent incidents three years ago.

In early September 2019, the Rashad, Ghadeer, and Talodi localities in South Kordofan witnessed almost daily mass protests and sit-ins against the use of toxic substances in gold mining after environmentalists reported the death of a large number of livestock and birds following the decision of the acting governor to resume mining in the state in July.

On September 11, the governor of South Kordofan ordered the closure of all mining plants in the state in reaction to pressure from environmental health activists and protesting residents who worried about the hazards of the use of the highly toxic mercury and cyanide to extract gold. The mining companies however refused to implement the governor’s order.

Concerned residents of Talodi and Kalogi continued to protest for at least another month.

Al Junaid and the RSF

Lt Gen Mohamed Hamdan ‘Hemeti’, Commander of the infamous paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that grew out of the Janjaweed and Deputy Chairman of Sudan’s Sovereignty Council, has family ties that link him to El Junaid Gold Mining Company, which is also the operator of the economically important Jebel Amer gold mines in North Darfur.

Former Janjaweed leader Musa Hilal seized control of the Jebel Amer gold mining area in July 2015 and, according to a UN Security Council report in April 2016, profited from vast gold sales. Sources claim that Hemeti was behind the arrest of Hilal in 2017 before taking over the operation of the mines. According to the NGO Global Witness, Hemeti captured a large part of the gold market in Sudan in previous years, bringing him much wealth and power.

In 2020, the government took over control of the Jebel Amer gold mines. Last year, however, CNN published an investigation disclosing how “Russia is plundering gold in Sudan to boost Putin’s war effort in Ukraine” with the complicity of Sudanese military rulers, especially the RSF.

Health risks

Environmentalists have been warning of the health and environmental hazards of the use of toxic mercury and cyanide to extract gold from ore for years.

A recent report on mercury poisoning in Sudan points out that “years of indiscriminate use of dangerous chemicals such as mercury, cyanide, and thiourea without protective measures for miners or local populations has exposed millions of citizens across Sudan to lethal risks”.

The Sudan Democracy First Group also highlighted the human and environmental costs of traditional gold mining in the region in a report published in November 2018.

In January 2018, a medical team led by the Health Minister of gold-rich South Kordofan investigated the increase in miscarriages, the birth of deformed children, and cases of kidney failure in El Tadamon.

At the same time, Northern State education authorities decided to close the Sawarda school complex in response to cases of coughing, vomiting, and shortness of breath among students. The situation was attributed to the poor environmental and health conditions due to activities of the International Company for Mining, which spread mining waste and dust in the area.

Source: Radio Dabanga

The recent increases in service fees are illegal because they are not based on a law and have not been approved by a legislative body, says lawyer El Moez Hazrat. Former rebel leader Yassir Arman also denounced the increases. Finance Minister Jibril Ibrahim denied being responsible for raises of fees and taxes in the states.

“Fees may not be imposed unless approved by the Legislative Council or a joint comittee made up of members of the Sovereignty Council and the Council of Ministers,” he told Radio Dabanga on Thursday.

“This is stipulated in the Constitutional Charter of August 2019. Since the coup d’état [of October 2021] however, both the Sovereignty Council and the Council of Ministers do not have legal status anymore. Any administrative court can cancel the fees because they were not enacted by law,” he explained.

“The Ministry of Finance seems to prefer to rely on levies to fill to the treasury, which exacerbates the situation in light of the scarcity of the simplest services in the country.”

The lawyer further criticised “the purchase of a large number of four-wheel drive vehicles in a country that lacks the most basic necessities of life”.

Yassir Arman, former rebel leader, founder of the SPLM Democratic Revolutionary Movement, and leading member of the Forces Freedom and Change-Central Council (FFC-CC), also condemned the Ministry of Finance’s “imposition of exorbitant fees and taxes on everything in the country, from education to roads” in a Tweet on Wednesday.

This is a crime against millions of poor people, he stated. “According to which law are these taxes and fees imposed, in the absence of any legislative body or even a cabinet?! The authorities put their hand in the pockets of those who have no pockets and let the fat cats who smuggle gold and resources escape the taxes.”

On Monday morning, vehicle owners in Sudan were surprised to hear about a more than 150 per cent increase in licensing and inspection fees.

‘Not responsible’

The Minister of Finance and Economic Planning denied his ministry’s responsibility for imposing any new fees and taxes, indicating that this is within the competence of the legislative authorities on a lower level.

Minister Jibril Ibrahim said on his Facebook page on Thursday that the role of the Finance Ministry is limited to approving taxes only. The Ministry of Finance has nothing to do with levies imposed in localities and states and their methods of collecting them, just as it has nothing to do with increased university fees, he stated.

Lawyer El Moez Hazrat responded to these statements by saying that they constitute “an evasion of responsibilities”, and pointed to the ministry’s official approval of the increases “which negatively affect the lives of the Sudanese people”.

In October last year, Ibrahim repudiated any further tax increases. Yet, a month earlier he called for expanding the ‘taxes umbrella’ [span of taxes] and said that he considered it “the most effective and successful way to increase tax revenues and combat tax evasion”. Sudan witnessed many protests against exorbitant tax increases last year.

Financial analyst Hafiz Ismail told Radio Dabanga on Tuesday that Minister Ibrahim should be dismissed. He “is taking advantage of the government vacuum and the absence of a legislative council to impose huge increases in service fees and taxes”.

The analyst warned for “the great impact of these decisions on the various segments of society” and said he wonders where the funds went that became available after the lifting of subsidies and increasing a number of taxes in 2022.

In November, following a new increase in fuel prices, Ismail said that they were “the result of chaotic economic policies and the failure of the state to find a real solution for the economic crisis.”

Source: Radio Dabanga

The parties and groups that signed the Framework Agreement with the military junta in Khartoum on December 5 say they reject the Egyptian initiative for an inter-Sudanese dialogue platform to be held in Cairo. “The dialogue process was agreed upon in advance and cannot be changed at the last moment,” a spokesperson said.

In a press statement following a meeting of the Framework Agreement signatories at the premises of the National Umma Party in Omdurman yesterday, Yousef urged the non-signatories to participate in the upcoming workshops in accordance with the Framework Agreement.

“There is no alternative to the Framework Agreement,” Khaled Omar Yousef, a leading member of the Forces for Freedom and Change-Central Council (FFC-CC) said. “The dialogue process was agreed upon in advance and cannot be changed at the last moment.”

In a bid to break the political stalemate between a number of political groups in Sudan over important but thorny issues in the Final Agreement on the coming transitional period, Egypt proposed a new platform for dialogue between the parties.

Some parties who have not signed the agreement welcomed the Egyptian initiative, such as the Forces for Freedom and Change-Democratic Block (FFC-DB).

FFC divisions

The FFC coalition has seen many internal divisions, with several split-off groups emerging in the past months.

The FFC-DB was formed two months ago and includes the National Accord Forces (NAF), themselves a split-off faction of the FFC also referred to as the FFC-National Accord, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), and the Sudanese Ba’ath Party, amongst others. In early December, the eastern Sudanese High Council of Beja Nazirs and Independent Chieftains faction presided over by Sayed Tirik joined the group.

The Socialist Arab Ba’ath Party recently left the FFC-CC altogether due to the fact that the majority of the coalition parties signed the Framework Agreement, which the party believes is “devoted to legitimising the October 25, 2021 coup”.

According to the FFC-CC, the only parties of the FFC-DB entitled to sign have been previously agreed upon, namely the Justice and Equality Movement and the Sudan Liberation Movement faction led by Minni Minawi. This stance sparked criticism as it was seen as exclusionary.

Planning

The Final Agreement, the second part of the agreement between the civilian groups and the military junta, was originally planned to be signed by the end of 2022. Later, this deadline was postponed but negotiations were announced to start by the end of December.

Yousef now announced that the dialogues that are to lead to a Final Agreement with the military junta will commence on January 8.

The next day, a three-day conference will be held in the Friendship Hall in Khartoum, to agree on the five outstanding issues of justice and transitional justice, security and military reform, approaches to empowerment removal*, possible amendments to the Juba Peace Agreement, and governance issues regarding eastern Sudan.

The meeting of the signatories confirmed that “participation of the broadest base of stakeholders” in the dialogue on these issues is needed “to develop the necessary solutions in a way that secures the transition to democracy”.

The FFC-CC wants to hold on to this planning, which does not hold space for the Egyptian initiative.

International support

Yousef welcomed positions supporting the Framework Agreement, the latest of which was the US Secretary of State supporting the agreement.

He praised the establishment of coordination mechanisms and unification of positions among the signatories to the Framework Agreement and pointed to “the importance of accelerating the pace to reach the Final Agreement in order to restore the transition path to democracy”.

The Trilateral Mechanism announced the holding of a series of meetings this week with the Joint Coordinating Committee of the signatory parties to the Framework Agreement in order to prepare for the next phase of the political process.

The Mechanism affirmed that it will continue to provide expertise and support for expanded consultations on the five issues.

Source: Radio Dabanga