On 22 December 2020, The United Nations Security Council unanimously voted to pull its peacekeepers from the African Union-UN agreement in Darfur, Sudan. The presence of peacekeepers was planned to end on 31 December, but Darfuris expected the UN to keep personnel in the region amid heightened tensions. The UN said all remaining operations will be in the form of a political agreement to promote peace. The UN undersecretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, Rosemary DiCarlo, said that the political mission will remain in Darfur with a team of advisers focusing on women’s rights and children’s protections, along with a team of human rights officers and police forces.
Following the ousting of former President Omar al-Bashir in 2019, Sudan’s Darfur region erupted into violence as militias, government forces, and other armed groups each vied for control. Each of these groups has been responsible for atrocities carried out against civilians. This violence, along with additional crimes against civilians, has been present in Darfur for over ten years. Because the violence is strongly influenced by ethnic relations in the region, the crimes against humanity in Darfur has been described as the first genocide of the 21st Century.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) argued that the UN cannot walk away from the civilians caught up in the violence, as the lack of peacekeepers in the region will cause a rise in tensions between ethnic groups. HRW pleaded that the international community listens to the needs of the Darfuris.
To know more, please visit:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/01/06/un-cannot-abandon-darfuris-amid-rising-violence
https://news.un.org/en/audio/2020/12/1080662
Author: Vito Quaglia
