Sudan to Evaluate Human Rights in Southern Kordofan, SUNA Says
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg)
Aug. 17 (Bloomberg) — Sudan is forming a committee to evaluate the human rights situation in Southern Korodfan, state- run SUNA news agency said, after the United Nations said war crimes may have been committed in the area.
The committee will include members from the Foreign Ministry, the military judiciary, the Ministry of Interior and state security, and will be headed by the presidency’s Advisory Council for Human Rights, Khartoum-based SUNA reported yesterday, citing Justice Minister Mohamed Bishara Doussa.
The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights called in an Aug. 15 report for an investigation into possible crimes against humanity and war crimes, allegedly committed mainly by government forces, during clashes in June with insurgents from the northern branch of South Sudan’s ruling party.
Fighting erupted a month before the July 9 independence ceremony that concluded South Sudan’s secession from Sudan, a move that capped a 2005 peace agreement ending a civil war between the north and south.
The UN said in the report said the Sudanese army and militia loyal to it may have carried out “extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests and illegal detention, enforced disappearances, attacks against civilians, including children, looting of civilian homes and destruction of property.”
Battles and airstrikes by the Sudanese army in Southern Kordofan forced more than 73,000 people to flee their homes, according to the UN.
Southern Kordofan is Sudan’s only oil-producing state, accounting for 115,000 barrels a day, according to Sudan’s minister of state for oil, Ali Ahmed Osman.
–Editor: Karl Maier, Heather Langan
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