The rape of 200 women and Systematic rape of many more in Sudan

According to reports that came out on the weekend of November 8, some 200 women, including 80 minors, were mass raped by a Sudanese army garrison in Tabit, a small village in northern Darfur. Soldiers supposedly began their raping spree on the night of November 8 until approximately 4AM the following day.

Upon hearing these accusations, Special Prosecutor for Crimes in Darfur Yasir Ahmed Mohamed immediately denied the accusations of the mass rape, claiming that it was a fabrication of social media.

Mohamed and other Sudanese officials had initially banned a team of investigators from the UN Hybrid Operations in Darfur (UNAMID) from carrying out investigations in Tabit. Yet, after finding little evidence to confirm reports of the mass rape, they eventually granted UNAMID access to Tabit.

The initial hesitation of the government to grant these officials access to the region has given more than enough reason for critics to question UNAMID’s findings. The delay could have given this purportedly devious government time to alter anything that could have led third-party officials to reach accurate conclusions as sensitive evidence would have been lost. In fact, later reports seem to support this fact. According to medical experts, it is now too late for the rape victims to provide forensic evidence of this incident, partly because of the delay by the Sudanese government and the fact that UNAMID waited close to 10 days to begin making significant moves in this investigation. Additionally, UN investigators sent to the region have admitted that they were escorted by the Sudanese military to the small village just 45 kilometers south-west of El-fasher, North Darfur’s capital. In fact, according to a local TV station called Ashorooq, local official Jar al-Nabi publicly demanded that the current head of UNAMID, Abiodun Oluremi Bashua, notify the Sudanese government of the movements of UNAMID convoys, in order to “promote security coordination”

It is worth arguing that the presence of the military in UNAMID’s investigations could very well have affected the responses of locals, witnesses and most certainly the victims of the purported mass rape by the Sudanese Army garrison. Perhaps this explains why UNAMID requested a second visit to the village under fairer circumstances--yet once again, the Sudanese government initially denied them access, stating that they were skeptical about the motives behind their insistence on visiting the village a second time.

Despite talks of cooperation between Bashua and South Darfur State governor Adam al-Nabi, trust and collaboration between the two simply failed to develop. If the incident did occur and supporting evidence is found, the Sudanese government will have many questions to answer. UNAMID is already under fire for not being insistent enough on its need for  investigations independent of the Sudanese government, leading many to believe that some UNAMID officials may have had their own ulterior motives in stalling thorough investigations.

Given this administration’s long history of systematically oppressing women, it islikely that these soldiers did commit these crimes, and are now exempt from consequences due to the overall ineffectiveness or incompetence of UNAMID.

Articles 151, 154 and 156 of Sudan’s criminal code alone enforce restrictions on the way women dress and behave in public. In the event that women commit an act arbitrarily determined by an officer to be a violation of these articles, they may be forced to pay a fine or worse, face verbal, physical and psychological abuses. Until this overarching issue is dealt with, events and allegations like this one may continue to take place.

A thorough and uninterrupted investigation is of the essence, if any truth is to emerge. Yet there is one thing that remains necessary: the need to keep Sudanese officials in check and provide protection for vulnerable groups in Sudanese society.