(New York) - Backed by the Sudanese government, Janjaweed militias are launching assaults across the border into Chad, attacking and looting Chadian villagers as well as refugees from Darfur. Despite a ceasefire agreement in Darfur, government troops and Janjaweed militias continue to commit atrocities in the western Sudanese region.
Human Rights Watch documented at least seven cross-border incursions into Chad conducted by the Janjaweed militias since early June. The Janjaweed attack villages in Chad and refugees from Darfur, and also steal cattle. The same Arab and African ethnic groups live on both sides of border in Chad and Darfur.
Meanwhile, Chadians living near the border are organized into self-defense groups to protect their families and livestock from Janjaweed raids. These self-defense groups have reportedly clashed with the Janjaweed militia.
“The Sudanese government must take full responsibility for the militia raids into Chad,” said Jemera Rone, Sudan researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Janjaweed are the government’s militia, and Khartoum has armed and empowered it to conduct ‘ethnic cleansing’ in Darfur.”
On Saturday, June 19, Sudanese President Omar el-Bashir ordered the disarmament of the Janjaweed. But a similar promise to “neutralize” the militia in the April 8 ceasefire agreement with Darfur rebel groups came to nothing. In the two months since the ceasefire, Sudanese government forces and Janjaweed militias have continued to attack the civilian population in Darfur, adding to the hundreds of villages they already destroyed and the 1 million persons they forcibly displaced.
In North Darfur on June 3, the Janjaweed attacked eight villages in the Jebel Mun area of West Darfur, and killed 13 villagers, all civilians, some of whom attempted to resist the looting with guns. The Sudanese government then bombed the area. In early June, Sudanese government aircraft also bombed locations in Darfur near Chadian border towns, including Birak, resulting in an unknown number of deaths. In late May, government forces had bombed the Darfur town of Tabit, south of El Fashir, killing at least 12 people in the market.
Human Rights Watch also investigated the use of rape by both Janjaweed and Sudanese soldiers against women from the three African ethnic groups targeted in the “ethnic cleansing” campaign in Darfur. The rapes are often accompanied by dehumanizing epithets, stressing the ethnic nature of the joint government-Janjaweed campaign. The rapists use the terms “slaves” and “black slaves” to refer to the women, who are mostly from the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups.
“Rape is a war crime. These women and girls have already been driven off their land, and now they face horrendous sexual attacks,” Rone said.
The conflict in Darfur is claiming new groups of victims—such as Chadians and displaced women—even as the humanitarian crisis, impacting the 1 million persons displaced by the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed, is entering its most critical phase. Officials from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) have warned that without full humanitarian access, 350,000 displaced civilians may die of hunger and disease in the coming months.
The Sudanese government has grudgingly granted limited humanitarian access, but not enough to provide for sufficient pre-positioning of food for the hundreds of thousands who will be cut off from relief soon. The rainy season that will flood the dry river beds and prevent relief trucks from delivering food has already begun.
Last week the Chadian government announced it might withdraw as mediator in the Darfur talks, on account of the Janjaweed attacks on Chad. On Friday, June 18, Chadian President Idriss Déby’s spokesman accused the Janjaweed of inflaming ethnic tensions by exclusively recruiting Arabs in Chad. The president’s spokesman also charged that the Janjaweed are reviving the Chadian anti-government rebel group, the Renewed National Front of Chad (Front National du Tchad Rénové, or FNTR), which has been dormant since 2002.
In mid-May, Chad suffered a coup attempt, believed to have been organized by some Chadian Zaghawa, who are unhappy with Déby’s cooperation with the Sudanese government in its war against Sudanese rebel Zaghawa in Darfur.
