United Nations — The UN Security Council imposed sanctions on four commanders of Sudan’s warring paramilitary forces suspected of committing atrocities against civilians, which UN experts said show… “Characteristics of Genocide.”
The four commanders of the Rapid Support Forces, which have been at war with the Sudanese army since 2023, were added to the blacklist for their activities in El Fasher, especially on October 26, the day the paramilitary force seized the North Darfur capital.
The UK imposed sanctions on the four leaders in December, and Tuesday’s designations follow a report released last week by UN-backed human rights experts. They reported that The Rapid Support Forces carried out mass killings And other atrocities in El Fasher after an 18-month siegeDuring which they imposed conditions “calculated to cause the physical destruction” of non-Arab societies.
United Nations officials say that several thousand civilians were killed as the Rapid Support Forces took control of El Fasher, the only remaining stronghold of the Sudanese army in the vast western Darfur region. Only 40% of the city’s population of 260,000 people He managed to escape Officials said that the attack injured thousands of them. The fate of the rest remains unknown.
Among those now facing a travel ban and financial freeze by the United Nations are the Forces Commander, Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, his brother and deputy commander, Abdel Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, and another deputy commander, Lieutenant General Gedo Hamdan Ahmed.
According to the Security Council committee monitoring sanctions against Sudan, the deputy commander of the Rapid Support Forces, Dagalo, was identified as having been at a base in El Fasher on the day the paramilitary forces seized power.
The committee said: “The footage believed to be of Daglo shows him giving direct orders to his fighters not to take prisoners but to kill everyone.” “Dagalo has previously been described as having played a key role in several attacks carried out by the army and RSF in the Sudanese border areas, and is seen as the commander in control of the RSF.”
The committee said the violence included targeted executions of non-Arabs and reports of widespread sexual violence, including gang rape in front of relatives, and kidnapping, including the detention of medical personnel for ransom.
The UN panel said Ahmed, also known as Abu Nashuk, was one of six generals in El Fasher and was seen in video footage alongside Dagalo on October 26 when the Rapid Support Forces committed mass killings of civilians.
The United Nations also imposed sanctions on the Brigadier General of the Rapid Support Forces. Brigadier General Al-Fateh Abdullah Idris, known as Abu Lulu and the “Butcher of El Fasher,” described him as a “major perpetrator” of the violence on the day he seized power.
The committee said: “He gave orders to his men to kill innocent people, and video clips show him executing civilians and bragging about killing more than 2,000 people.” She said the videos were taken by the paramilitary forces themselves.
“Abu Lulu filmed himself smiling and killing people as they begged for mercy, in addition to videos of him carrying out targeted executions based on ethnicity,” the United Nations said. “The footage shows him shooting unarmed men and standing between the bodies showing the people he killed.”
Among the 10 people sanctioned this week is RSF field commander Tijani Ibrahim Musa Muhammad, also known as Al-Zir Salem, who also appeared in a video in El Fasher on October 26.
Cameron Hudson, a former US diplomat and expert on Sudan, said on Wednesday in a post on the X website that all 10 were either members of the Rapid Support Forces or the Janjaweed. Formed in 2013, the RSF emerged from the Janjaweed militia, which had fought in Darfur since the early 2000s in a fierce campaign against non-Arab tribes and rebels in the region. He urged the United Nations to “impose sanctions on the entire group as terrorists.”
Hudson told the Associated Press that the sanctions are “an important step in the United Nations’ reaffirmation of its role in Sudan” and should be viewed as a moment to redouble efforts to end the fighting and ensure accountability for the crimes of the RSF.
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Associated Press writer Sam Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.