On Thursday, the UN’s top humanitarian official, Tom Fletcher, briefed ambassadors at the Security Council about the “darker hell” to which El Fasher has descended.
“Women and girls are being raped, people being mutilated and killed – wiht utter impunity,” he said, detailing reports that have penetrated the telecommunications blackout gripping the war-torn country. “We cannot hear the screams, but – as we sit here today – the horror is continuing.”
In the shadow of Sudan‘s misery, United States President Donald Trump has done conspicuously little. He insists he’s the world’s greatest peacemaker – claiming credit for resolving conflicts that, in some instances, are either still raging or never existed in the first place. But ending the world’s greatest humanitarian disaster has not been a priority for his administration.The White House was more focused on gutting USAID, an agency that propped up critical elements of the humanitarian complex aiding Sudanese people. It also wants to fast-track deportations of unwanted migrants to neighbouring South Sudan, which itself is in the grip of a brewing civil war.
There’s no simple solution to ending the war in Sudan. The two rival forces – the Sudanese military under## UAE Accused of Fueling Sudan’s War, as Calls Grow for Action
The United Arab Emirates is facing mounting accusations of providing substantial military support to the rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan, effectively prolonging the brutal conflict ravaging the country. Experts and lawmakers are increasingly vocal about the UAE’s role,with some suggesting former US President Donald Trump is uniquely positioned to intervene.
“The war would be over if not for the UAE,” Cameron Hudson, a former chief of staff to successive US presidential special envoys for Sudan, told the *Journal*. “The only thing that is keeping [the RSF] in this war is the overwhelming amount of military support that they’re receiving from the UAE.”
A host of analysts believe Trump could do more to lean on the UAE, a monarchy to which he has many close connections.
After relative silence, lawmakers in Congress are also starting to speak up. Senator James Risch,a Republican from Idaho and the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations committee,called on the US to officially designate the RSF as a foreign terrorist organisation.
“The horrors in Darfur’s El fasher were no accident – they were the RSF’s plan all along,” he said in a statement on Tuesday. “The RSF has waged terror and committed unspeakable atrocities, genocide among them, against the Sudanese people.”
An injured man who fled El Fasher seeks shelter at the refugee camp in Tawila on Friday.Credit: AP