Derry vigil will urge international community to ‘Stop the War in Sudan’

Members of the local Sudanese community will gather in Guildhall Square on Monday evening to highlight the terrible atrocities taking place in their country.

It is over two years since Sudan was plunged into war after a vicious struggle for power broke out between its army and the paramilitary group, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

But the horrors being visited upon the country’s civilian population reached a new level of brutality last month when the RSF seized a key military base in El Fasher, a city in Sudan’s Darfur region.

After the capture, the RSF was accused of killing more than 2,000 unarmed civilians, with Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab calling the level of violence comparable to the first 24 hours of the Rwandan genocide.

Reports suggest that up to 150,000 people have lost their lives in Sudan in the past two years, with the Sudanese Government describing what is happening as a genocide.

According to the UN Security Council, the east African country is in the grip of “the world’s worst hunger and displacement crisis” with hundreds of thousands of inhabitants facing starvation. Famine conditions have already been confirmed in El Fasher and Kadugli.

Derry’s Sudanese community, supported by United Against Racism, are encouraging people to join them on Monday evening at 6pm for a vigil in Guildhall Square aimed at highlighting the ongoing barbarity.

Among the speakers will be Farida Hassan who had to flee Sudan in March this year due to her political activism.

Ms Hassan said, “We are holding this peaceful vigil to demand an end to the war in Sudan and to stop the ethnic cleansing, sexual violence and starvation of innocent children.

“This is a military conflict between two armed forces. It is not a civil war and innocent civilians are paying with their lives.

“It is time for the world to act and help end the suffering of the Sudanese people.”