On 23 April, it was announced that almost 98% of voters in Darfur’s referendum voted for maintaining the region as five states. The referendum – organised over three days in mid-April by the Sudanese authorities – allowed the people of Darfur to decide whether to keep the current arrangement of five states or to reunify…
Mr. Aristide Nononsi UN Independent Expert on the situation of Human Rights in Sudan Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights United Nations Office in Geneva 8-14 Avenue de la Paix CH-1211 Geneva 10 Switzerland By email: iesudan@ohchr.org 26 April 2016 Dear Mr Nononsi, We, Sudanese and international human rights organisations concerned with issues…
With the UNAMID mandate renewal under discussion at the UN Security Council, a new report released today by the International Refugee Rights Initiative provides an analysis of the joint United Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) as seen by some of the civilians the force is mandated to protect. The report, “’No one on the…
IRRI, together with the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies (ACJPS) and International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) today published a joint briefing for UN member states setting out key concerns and recommendations to improve the human rights situation in Sudan in advance of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) for Sudan, scheduled to take place on…
(31 March 2016) The efforts of the Government of Sudan to obstruct the engagement of civil society activists in a United Nations (UN)-led human rights review of the country is unacceptable and shows blatant contempt not just for human rights defenders in Sudan, but to human rights standards and the UN Human Rights Council, 36 Sudanese and international…
H.E. Mr. Ban Ki-Moon Secretary General of the United Nations New York, NY 10017 President Barack Obama The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 RE: Unhindered Assistance from Multiple Locations for the Two Areas and throughout Sudan Your Excellency and Mr. President, In light of the impasse at the 10th round of…
Last week the Be’er-Sheva District Court rejected a petition filed by two Eritrean asylum seekers and six Israeli NGOs against the government’s new policy of imprisoning irregular migrants who are unwilling to leave Israel to Uganda or Rwanda. By doing so, the court gave a green light to the indefinite imprisonment of Eritreans and Sudanese…
Imagine you are born in a country, to parents who were also born in that country, and all your life you believed you were a citizen of that country – with all the rights that go along with it. Then, one day when you apply for a standard identification document, you are told you are…
On 21 September 2015 the African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies (ACJPS), International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), and International Refugee Rights Initiative (IRRI) made a stakeholder submission to the Universal Periodic Review of Sudan 2016. The submission details human rights developments in Sudan, including legal and institutional, documented by our organisations since the…
The Bill of Rights enshrined in Sudan’s 2005 Interim National Constitution (INC) guarantees a number of rights and Article 27(3) provides that all human rights treaties ratified by Sudan are an integral part of it. Despite this, a number of Sudan’s laws infringe on fundamental rights and freedoms and fail to provide effective remedies. The…
On Sunday 9 August, the Ugandan government announced that Sudan’s President Omar Bashir would join Ugandan president, Yoweri Museveni, Kenya’s president, Uhuru Kenyatta and Ethiopian Prime Minister, Hailemariam Desalegn in Entebbe to discuss the political crisis in neighbouring South Sudan. The Ugandan government assured Bashir that they would not arrest him. As the government spokesperson…
Dear Special Envoy Ambassador Booth, In the run up to your visit to Sudan at the end of July, we, the undersigned Sudanese, African and international non-governmental organisations, are writing to brief you on some of our key concerns in regards to the human rights and humanitarian situation in Sudan. While we welcome your visit…
The following blog was originally posted on the IntLawGrrls website. The recent elections in Sudan call into question the legitimacy of the government soon to be re-elected. Even if the elections had been free and fair (which they have not), the government’s legitimacy would be challenged unequivocally by the fact that the very same government…
(This blog first appeared on OpenDemocracy https://www.opendemocracy.net/arab-awakening/lucy-hovil/silence-over-sudan%E2%80%99s-bombing-of-civilians) The recent elections in Sudan call into question the legitimacy of the government soon to be re-elected. Even if the elections had been free and fair (which they have not), the government’s legitimacy would be challenged unequivocally by the fact that the very same government currently being re-elected into…
A new report launched today by the International Refugee Rights Initiative and the National Human Rights Monitoring Organisation brings the voices of civilians living through the conflict in Sudan’s Southern Kordofan State to the international community. Focusing on the devastating impact of the conflict on every aspect of people’s lives, the report highlights the…
The ongoing conflict in Sudan’s Southern Kordofan (SK) and Blue Nile (BN) states, while massively underreported, has had devastating consequences. Widespread aerial bombardment of rebel held civilian areas by the government of Sudan (GoS) are a hallmark of the conflict, and more than 3,000 bombs – on average three a day – have fallen since…
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Excellencies, Representatives of the AU Peace and Security Council Member States, H.E. Chairperson Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, African Union Commission, H.E. President Thabo Mbeki, Chair of the AU High-Level Implementation Panel, Your Excellencies, We, the undersigned Sudanese and African civil society organizations, write with deep concern about the decision of the African…
(19 December 2014) Open Letter concerning the arbitrary arrest and incommunicado detentions of Dr Amin Mekki Medani, Mr Farouq Abu Eissa, and Dr Farah Ibrahim Mohamed Alagar by the Government of Sudan.
There is considerable concern about the well-being of Hawa Suleiman , a young activist and a student at Alzaiem Alazhari University arrested during the eviction of Zahra Women’s Dormitory in Khartoum by the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) forces during Eid al-Adha holiday (5/6 October 2014). Suleiman was arrested along with 17 other student activists, yet…
