Sudan’s war directly impacting children’s lives

The Raoul Wallenberg Centre had reported for Human Rights that children “are being deliberately targeted” in Sudan’s war.

According to Middle East Eye, on October 15, an investigation was conducted, and both the Sudanese armed forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF)have “committed widespread atrocities against children, including sexual violence, killings and the destruction of schools and hospitals.

The rise in sexual violence and gender based violence against children in Sudan has risen. Children as young as one have been subjected to sexual violence.

UNICEF, the UN children’s agency, has estimated that around 12 million Sudanese civilians are at risk of gender based violence.

Sexual violence is heavily underreported, especially in cases involving children, because of social stigma, fear of retaliation or reprisals.

The UN verified in April that “a dramatic increase in grave violations against children, especially in the Darfur region, with children being killed and maimed at unprecedented levels.”

On September 25, it was announced that Doctors Without Borders (MSF) had given medical care to over 600 victims of sexual violence in North Darfur.

Most of the sexual violence was carried out by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. Since April 2023, RSF and the military have been at war following a violent escalation of a power struggle.

The air, since then, which has reached Sudan, has caused the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, according to the UN.

On September 20, the UN Human Rights Office accused RSF fighters of raping women and girls during an assault on the ZamZam camp—one horrific case of 12 fighters raping five women in front of their children.

Not only is there a serious issue with the sexual violence and killings in Sudan, but the suffering of malnutrition has also declined.

Nearly four million children under the age of five are going through malnutrition, and the entire population of El-Fashar, the capital of North Darfur, has been under an RSF siege for more than 500 days, living in paucity conditions.

Sudan’s war has also left a mother unable to save both of her children, with both of her children malnourished and not eating for days.

Toma, a mother of two, is among the many mothers suffering under Sudan’s poor humanitarian crisis.

Toma expressed in an interview that she had not eaten in days, and her three-year-old malnourished daughter, Masajed, is just lying in her arms, completely still.

The hospitals provide basic care and treatment to civilians for free, but many of the medicines have to be paid for by the families.

Toma was torn when she had to make a distressing decision of having to choose between Masajed and her twin sister Manahill, after realising they could only afford antibiotics for one of their children.

The Raoul Wallenberg Centre made a statement stating “despite the scale of the emergency, the international response remains gravely inadequate, marked by an inacusable shortfall in humanitarian funding, a shameful void in conflict resolution and a neglect of justice.”

Middle East Eye, Maghrebi.org