Sudan: Indiscriminate killing and sexual assault of young girls

Since June 2011, conflict between the Government of Sudan and the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army-North (SPLA-N) has been raging in Sudan's Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile states.  The conflict which commenced following disputed state elections in South Kordofan, has intensified daily and reports of serious human rights abuses have frequently surfaced.

Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced within the two states while more than 200,000 have fled to refugee camps in South Sudan and Ethiopia.  The conflict has witnessed the indiscriminate bombing and killing of civilians and the systematic sexual abuse of women and young girls.  In a 39-page report based on five year research missions in areas within the two states, Human Rights Watch documents numerous human rights violations and abuses (PDF). The cases of a 17 year old girl who was instantly killed in front of her mother when she was hit in the head by fragments of a bomb dropped from an aeroplane, and the farmer who was unrecognisable by his family and friends after his body was cut into numerous pieces after being hit by a shell, illustrate the daily atrocities civilians face.  The civilian population live in fear and subsequently go hungry as they are too afraid to venture out in search of food and water, for fear of being attacked and sexually assaulted.

Who then will speak out against the violations and abuses being perpetrated against the innocent civilians?

Who will be a voice for the voiceless?

It is high time that the international community took a unified stance against such atrocities in Sudan's Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile states, and exert maximum pressure on the Government of Sudan, demanding an immediate end to the human rights violations and abuses!