Three sisters raped at gunpoint in Central Darfur

Three sisters aged between 18 and 23 were severely beaten and raped at gunpoint by a group of unidentified armed men during a raid on their farms in Khor Bared, nine kilometres west of Nierteti in Central Darfur, on Friday. Two other farmers were also injured in the attack.

Adam Okro, a community leader in the Nierteti camps for displaced people, told Radio Dabanga that the gunmen entered the area on Friday and attacked the three young women as they tended their farm. The women were tied up, beaten, raped at gunpoint and left in a wadi with various head and leg injuries.

In the same incident, the gunmen attacked tied up farmers Abdeen Abdulmahmoud, 28, and Ahmed Idris Ismail, 34, with their hands and feet as they were planting crops. Okro told Radio Dabanga that the gunmen beat the farmers, who live in the Northern Nierteti refugee camp, with rifle butts and whips.

He says a report has been filed with the Nierteti police and the injured have been taken to Nierteti hospital for treatment.

Conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV)

As Radi Dabanga previously reported, reports of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), systematically used as a tool of war, have been widespread since the outbreak of current hostilities that erupted in mid-April 2023 between the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). This follows a similar pattern to previous hostilities spanning decades, including the Darfur conflict. A new report by the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) network, identifying sexual violence as the “forgotten atrocities” of the Sudan war, examines and highlights the dire circumstances facing Sudanese women amid the ongoing crisis.