Thousands of women fleeing violence in El Fasher are subjected to rape, starvation and bombing while seeking refuge, the United Nations reported on Tuesday. Photo by Marwan Mohamed/EPA
Nov. 11 (UPI) — Women fleeing El Fasher in western Sudan are subjected to rape, starvation and deadly bombing, the United Nations reported on Tuesday.
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces recently captured El Fasher after a 500-day siege and are using rape as a “weapon of war,” according to the United Nations.
“Women speaking to us from El Fasher, the heart of Sudan’s latest catastrophe, tell us that they’ve endured starvation, displacement, rape and bombardment,” said Anna Mutavati, U.N. Women regional director for East and Southern Africa.
“Pregnant women have given birth in the streets as the last remaining maternity hospitals were looted and destroyed,” she added.
“What the women tell us in that on their horrific journey, every step that they’ve taken to fetch water, to collect firewood or to stand in a food line has carried a high risk of sexual violence,” Mutavati said.
“There is mounting evidence that rape is being deliberately and systematically used as a weapon of war.”
The situation is getting worse as fighting spreads throughout El Fasher, forcing thousands of women and girls to flee the city or risk being killed, raped or otherwise brutalized by RSF forces, the United Nations reported.
El Fasher is the capital of North Darfur and was the area’s last stronghold for the Sudanese Armed Forces amid the civil war in Sudan. An estimated 89,000 people have fled El Fasher and often seek refuge in Tawila, which is about 45 miles away, as well as Korma and Malit.
Humanitarian resources are scarce in those locales, though, according to the United Nations.
Satellite images also show evidence of widespread summary executions and other likely war crimes committed by the RSF, the Australian Broadcasting Company reported.
“All of my patients, my staff and everyone else in the hospital were killed,” a medical professional identified as “Abdullah” told the ABC. “They shot them all.”
Abdullah was part of the Saudi Hospital staff in El Fasher, where the World Health Organization said more than 460 patients and their companions were killed by RSF members.
At least six healthcare workers also were taken by the RSF, according to the WHO.