NAIROBI, 16 November 2004 — The Sudanese government is still attacking villagers in Darfur and rebel groups there are looting and abducting civilians despite an April cease-fire, a rights group said yesterday.
The New York-based Human Rights Watch also urged the UN Security Council to press Khartoum to take immediate action to reverse “ethnic cleansing” in the western Darfur region. The Security Council meets at a special session on Sudan in Nairobi on Thursday and Friday. The report charged government action has already resulted in ethnic cleansing in Darfur and accused the two main rebel groups fighting in the western region of regularly violating the pact.
“The government in particular has continued to use helicopter gunships in bombing attacks on civilian objects. Fighting and displacement continue, particularly in South Darfur,” the report says of attacks as recent as October. “Unless the UN backs up its earlier ultimatums with strong action, ethnic cleansing in Darfur will be consolidated,” said Peter Takirambudde of Human Rights Watch for Africa. Khartoum has defended more recent attacks as legitimate responses to the insurgency. The report said ethnic cleansing in Darfur consists of “forcibly displacing people, then preventing them from returning home safely” and said government forces were raiding camps using tear gas to force some 1.5 million displaced people to relocate to areas other than their homes.
