Amsterdam / London — Video clips of prisoners taken by the warring Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) widely circulating on social media spark angry reactions. The Centre for Information Resilience has verified thousands of footages so far for future efforts to hold the perpetrators to account.
After scenes of beheadings disappeared from social media, other clips appeared, of RSF paramilitaries soldiers humiliating captured army soldiers and forcing them to repeat the RSF slogan "readiness, speed, decisiveness," in an attempt to extract their admission of their defeat.
It appears from the footage that the prisoners have no choice but to obey the orders of their captors or be killed, such as the case of First Lieutenant Mohamed Siddig, who refused to obey the orders of his captors.
Members of the SAF commit the same practices against relatives of RSF paramilitaries.
"What we are witnessing in the Sudanese war these days falls under the category of 'abnormal acts' that cannot be controlled," military expert Awad El Mamour told Radio Dabanga on Wednesday.
"Thousands of prisoners from the army, including SAF Inspector General Lt Gen Mubarak Kuti, held by the RSF are not visited by internation organisations," he said and noted that "the Sudanese army does not care about him either, and did not ask the Red Cross for instance to intervene to ensure his safety and human treatment by the RSF.
"Therefore, humanitarian organisations must intervene and request good treatment from the RSF for these people, without fear of the Islamists and the Balabesa* crowd, labelling them as the humanitarian wing of the RSF, just as the Tagadom alliance is accused of being the political backer of the paramilitary group," military expert Awad Mamur told Radio Dabanga.
"These scenes are painful and sad to see because they are take place among Sudanese, and exceed the traditions the Sudanese nation is known for. These actions will inevitably create a rift in the fabric of Sudanese society that will be difficult to mend."
The military expert ruled out the possibility that "the leaders of both sides will condemn the acts of torturing prisoners, as both are using the same approach that aims to spread terror in the souls of the fighters of the enemy".
'Gross violations'
Lawyer and human rights defender Moez Hadra strongly criticised the humiliation and torture of prisoners. "It is a gross violation of international humanitarian law, human rights principles, and the four Geneva Conventions of 1959 on the protection of civilians in times of war and the treatment of prisoners," he told Radio Dabanga yesterday. "The Sudanese Criminal Act also prohibits torture of military prisoners."
Hadra expressed his regret that "both belligerents continue to disregard all these laws," and added that "the violations of these laws were and are not limited to military prisoners abut also civilians. Soldiers from both sides continue to torture civilians who are moving from one area to another, and each side accuses them of supporting the enemy."
The lawyer further pointed to the detention of people on ethnic grounds. "This phenomenon is leading Sudan to a more complex situation," he warned.
'Fall of justice system'
He accused the RSF and the army and its Islamist brigades of committing war crimes.
"All these violations prompted Sudanese human rights groups, lawyers and others, to demand the intervention of the UN Human Rights Council and form a fact-finding committee, as the Sudanese justice system has fallen horribly and did and still does not fulfil its legal duty," Hadra explained.
"It is widely believed that the judicial group currently residing in Port Sudan has become a tool in the hands of the army, who make them do whatever they want," he said and criticised the National Committee for the Investigation of War Crimes as it "it was formed by one of the parties to the war, and therefore cannot be neutral".
He further expected that international justice will lead to not escaping punishment. "The two parties to the war did not abide by international or domestic laws, nor even the Jeddah and Geneva agreements they signed. The role of international criminal justice is important here, because it only intervenes when domestic justice fails.
"The failure of the leaders of the warring parties to condemn these crimes confirms that they do not respect the laws," the lawyer stated. "We have not seen any investigation committees from either side that have brought violators to trial. Condemnations by RSF Commander Hemedti on social media are for propaganda purposes only."
'Little fear'
Two days ago, The Guardian posted an article on RSF paramilitaries posting "self-incriminating videos of torture and arson" on social media.
"We're in a situation where abusers are filming themselves, giving us evidence of what's happening when we don't have much information generally," said Alessandro Accorsi, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group. "They can do that because they probably feel little fear of consequences and because the cost opportunity of inditement is far greater than the punishment."
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Anouk Theunissen, from the Sudan Witness project of the London-based Centre for Information Resilience, said they had collected and verified thousands of open sourced footage so far to provide information and data for future efforts to hold perpetrators to account.
Cameron Hudson, senior fellow in the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington DC, on his X account yesterday expressed a less optimistic view: "It's telling that a lack of fear of consequences is driving belligerents on both sides in the war in #Sudan to post their abuses to social media. There really is no international community."
* Bal in Sudanese colloquial language reportedly comes from the word 'balawit' which means an attack without mercy. Balabesa (pl) is derived from the Sudanese expression bal bas (bal only) that came up during the war and is said about Islamists and others who are accused of supporting the continuation of the war. During the December 2018 Revolution young protesters often chanted 'el hal fi 'l bal' (the solution is in the bal) that reportedly refers to a complete and neat solution.
