SUDAN NEWS ALERT: AFP – Sudan wheat harvest waits to rot as hunger crisis looms

19/6/2022: AFP – Sudan wheat harvest waits to rot as hunger crisis looms

Amid Sudan’s acute food insecurity, AFP report that Sudanese farmers fear that their wheat harvest will rot in the absence of buyers, with agricultural expert Abdulkarim Omar noting that wheat can rot within three months if stored inadequately.

Thousands of farmers cultivated wheat as part of Sudan’s Al-Gezira agricultural scheme after the government promised to buy it at $75 per sack, with a farmer telling AFP that they did not need adequate storage places because the government bought their entire harvest.

However, Sudan’s agricultural bank – which buys the harvests - has been unable to receive money from the finance ministry or central bank owing to a worsening economic crisis after the October military coup.

Traders have offered to buy the wheat at prices that barely cover production costs leaving farmers will little incentive to cultivate wheat, notes Omar Marzouk, the governor of the Al-Gezira scheme.

SUDAN INSIGHT ALERT: Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa - Darfur still stands between the spread of COVID-19, organized violence, and the absence of rule of law

19/6/2020: Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa - Darfur still stands between the spread of COVID-19, organized violence, and the absence of rule of law

 On the International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) called for an “inclusive, just, and fair approach to peacebuilding” in Darfur.

 SIHA call for the Sudanese government to:

• Invest in justice and law enforcement infrastructure and survivor support services.

•   Establish Darfur civilian regional governments and local legislative councils, and supporting them in “setting clear security arrangements and disarmament programmes with firm deadlines.”

• Develop internal justice mechanisms inclusive of Darfuri civil society, particularly women and youth, and compliant with reparations demands from sexual violence survivors.

• Ratify the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, and the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, and abide by Resolution 1325.

 SIHA reported that rapes of displaced women in el-Fasher, north Darfur, have risen by 50%.

SUDAN INSIGHT ALERT: Radio Dabanga - Darfur displaced: ‘Arms collection an excuse to dismantle camps’

19/6/2020: Radio Dabanga - Darfur displaced: ‘Arms collection an excuse to dismantle camps’

 Radio Dabanga report that, according to Yagoub Abdallah Furi, a representative of the general coordination of Darfur camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs), a weapon collections campaign conducted by South Darfur authorities, the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are a “justification for dismantling the camps that stand as witness to the horrors of [al-Bashir’s] regime [which] gives government militias the greenlight to burn…camps in Darfur.”

 Furi said that South Darfur (military) governor Major General Hashim Khaled and the government “are fully aware the weapons are [only] in the hands of their tribal militias, who protect them and cover-up their crimes,” calling for militias to be disarmed. 

 Furi also said the UN-AU Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) and the government would be “responsible for the consequences of any hostile action by Khaled or any other government party,” with UNAMID “the only force entrusted with protecting and supervising the camps.”

SUDAN INSIGHT ALERT: Radio Dabanga - Darfur lawyers urge leaders to adopt ‘community solutions for societal recovery’

19/6/2020: Radio Dabanga - Darfur lawyers urge leaders to adopt ‘community solutions for societal recovery’

 Radio Dabanga reports that the Darfur Bar Association (DBA) calls on native administration leaders in Nyala, South Darfur’s capital “to adopt and produce community solutions that enhance, serve, and strengthen human relations and social cohesion”, following the killing of two in Kalma camp.

 The DBA called on community leaders to adopt and produce community solutions that include “learning lessons in a way that enhances, serves, and strengthens human relations and social cohesion,” adding that the community solutions “will encourage society to move past the hateful past of the repulsive regime and establish foundations for societal recovery.”

SUDAN INSIGHT ALERT: Financial Times - The fight to control Africa's digital revolution

19/6/19: Financial Times  – The fight to control Africa’s digital revolution, by David Pilling

 FT Africa editor David Pilling argues that the Sudan internet blackout reflects a wider pattern of African restrictions on online activism, arguing that governments in Africa have a massive opportunity to use the digital revolution to improve the lives of their citizens, but “too many are using it against them”

 Pilling notes the importance of the internet as a reliable source of information amid heavily controlled print media, but also highlights that the internet is also a source of “rumour and deception,” leading Ugandan and Tanzanian authorities to enact social media taxes.

 Pilling notes Africa’s technological reliance on China, with African governments, such as Zimbabwe, reportedly enlisting the services of Chinese surveillance companies to spy on their citizens. However, there are also allegations that China has “bugged” the African Union’s headquarters.

SUDAN NEWS ALERT: Radio Dabanga - Sudanese Professionals Association meets UAE, Egypt, EU ambassadors

19/6/19: Radio Dabanga- Sudanese Professionals Association meets UAE, Egypt, EU ambassadors

 Radio Dabanga reports that representatives of the Sudanese Professions Association (SPA) have held meetings with the ambassador of the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and the European Union in recent days, in order to discuss the current situation in Sudan.

 The SPA affirmed on Wednesday that the demands of the Alliance for Freedom and Change were a key topic of discussion at the meetings. The demands include the calling for an independent investigation into the June 3 massacre, return of internet services, return of military forces to their barracks and an end to the security restrictions and the media blackout.

The UAE ambassador claimed to support the some of the demands called for by the AFC and said that they support any agreement reached by the Sudanese, albeit stressing that their position was ‘non-biased’. 

SUDAN NEWS ALERT: AP - ICC prosecutor: Sudan authorities should handover ex-leader

19/6/19: AP - ICC prosecutor: Sudan authorities should handover ex-leader, by Edith M. Lederer

 AP reports that Fatou Bensouda, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, urged Sudan’s transitional authorities on Wednesday to hand over or prosecute ousted President Omar Al Bashir and four others for alleged war crimes in Darfur.

 Bensouda told the UN Security Council that she is ready to work with authorities “to ensure that the Darfur suspects face independent and impartial justice” either at the ICC in The Hague, Netherlands, or in Sudan if its court meets international standards.

 Bensouda said she didn’t underestimate “the complexity and fluidity of the events unfolding in Sudan,” but declared it was now time to act and ensure that the ICC suspects face justice.

SUDAN NEWS ALERT: Multiple sources - Al Burhan says military is ready to negotiate with opposition

19/6/19: Multiple sources - Al Burhan says military is ready to negotiate with opposition

• Reuters, by Khalid Abdelaziz

• AP, by Hussein Malla and Samy Magdy

The head of Sudan’s ruling military council, Abdulfattah Al Burhan, said the military was ready to meet the Declaration of Freedom and Change (DFC) opposition alliance to negotiate the Sudan’s transition towards democracy, after talks collapsed following the deadly dispersal of a protest sit-in on June 3.

 Al Burhan said “we do not deny [the DFC] role in the uprising or in the popular revolution, their leadership of the masses.”

 He added that the alliance should return to talks without preconditions, and that the solution “solution must be satisfactory for all the Sudanese people…we will not accept any solution that excludes any faction of the Sudanese people.”