When foreign diplomats fled Sudan as fighting engulfed Khartoum, some denied Sudanese civilians the means to follow them to safety. American and French staff shredded passports handed in by those seeking visas, to ensure they did not fall into the wrong hands. Others simply left them locked inside abandoned embassies.
This speaks to the disregard shown to those caught up in the struggle between two generals: Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan’s army chief and de facto leader, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, who commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The fighting is not only trashing hospitals, markets and homes. The political analyst Kholood Kair says the conflict has “completely annihilate[d] Sudanese political, social and economic life”. The UN expert for human rights in Sudan, Radhouane Nouicer, warned on Tuesday: “This is the destruction of a country in a way that is dehumanising its people.” More than 850 civilians have been killed, thousands injured and hundreds of thousands displaced since violence erupted in mid-April.
