Darfur Peace and Development

Serious abuses have increased in Darfur in the past six months while the world’s attention has focused on Southern Sudan’s upcoming independence, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The United Nations Security Council, which will be briefed on Darfur on June 8, 2011, and the African Union should do much more to ensure that those responsible for continued war crimes in Darfur are held accountable and press the Sudanese government to end attacks on civilians in Darfur, cease arbitrary detention of rights activists, and reform the state security apparatus, Human Rights Watch said.

The 28-page report, “Darfur in the Shadows: The Sudanese Government’s Ongoing Attacks on Civilians and Human Rights,” documents the intensification of the eight-year conflict over the past six months. Since December 2010, a surge in government-led attacks on populated areas and a campaign of aerial bombing have killed and injured scores of civilians, destroyed property, and displaced more than 70,000 people, largely from ethnic Zaghawa and Fur communities linked to rebel groups, Human Rights Watch said.

(New York) – Intensified fighting between the Sudanese government and rebel forces in 2010 has caused many hundreds of deaths and mass displacements in Darfur and should prompt the United Nations to ensure that international peacekeepers strengthen protection for civilians, Human Rights Watch said today. The UN Security Council is expected to renew the mandate of the Darfur peacekeeping mission in late July 2010.

Fighting among rebel groups and between rival…

(New York) – The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant on July 12, 2010, for President Omar al-Bashir of Sudan for genocide committed in Darfur. An earlier arrest warrant for al-Bashir was issued in March 2009 by the ICC for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur.

This is the first time the ICC has issued an arrest warrant for the crime of genocide. The warrant is for…

Hold Security Forces Accountable for Violations in April 2010 Elections

Events of 2009

(New York) – The United States should put pressure on governments identified by the State Department as using child soldiers to end the practice or lose US military assistance, Human Rights Watch said today.

The State Department’s 2010 annual report on Trafficking in Persons, issued today, identifies six governments involved in the recruitment and use of child soldiers. A US law enacted in 2008 prohibits several categories of US military assistance…

Court Prosecutor to Brief Council on Darfur Cases

Charge or Free Detainees, End Censorship, Enact Reforms

Governments Should Not Meet with Officials Wanted for War Crimes