UN News Today 08 November 2024 |

Sudan’s displaced have endured ‘unimaginable suffering, brutal atrocities’: UNHCR

Sudan’s displaced have endured “unimaginable suffering” including murder and mass rape in their search for shelter from the country’s ongoing war, UN humanitarians warned on Friday.

It’s been 19 months since conflict erupted between the Sudanese army and the rival Rapid Support Forces militia, over the transfer of power to civilian rule.

According to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, more than three million people have now been forced to flee the country in search of safety, while many millions more remain displaced inside Sudan.

At a briefing in Geneva, UNHCR’s Dominique Hyde recounted the testimonies of survivors she met in Chad last week:

“I spoke to people who watched while their families were murdered. People are targeted on the basis of their ethnicity. Men and boys are killed and their bodies are burned. Women raped while fleeing. People told me over and over again how they remember the bodies they saw abandoned by the road as they were fleeing.”

Ms. Hyde described Chad as “a sanctuary” and “a lifeline” for 700,000 war refugees.

To date UNHCR and partners have relocated more than 370,000 refugees inside Chad to new and expanded settlements, “but tens of thousands of families are still waiting for that opportunity to start over”, she insisted.

In October alone, some 60,000 Sudanese arrived in Chad following an escalation of fighting in Darfur – and as floodwaters receded.

The border town of Adre in Chad used to be home to 40,000 people, but it now hosts around 230,000 Sudanese refugees.

“The exodus from Sudan continues, reaching levels not seen since the beginning of the crisis,” Ms. Hyde said.

UN rights chief Türk demands justice for violations in Gaza, Israel

The UN’s Human Rights chief, Volker Türk, has demanded justice for grave violations of international law committed in Israel and Gaza since 7 October last year.

Mr. Türk’s appeal coincides with a new report from his Office, OHCHR, detailing what he called the “horrific reality that has unfolded for the people of Israel and Gaza”, since Hamas-led terror attacks sparked the war.

“I have repeatedly warned about the risk of atrocity crimes being committed,” he said, adding that “the rules of war, in force now for 160 years, were designed to limit and prevent human suffering in times of armed conflict”.

The OHCHR report contains detailed analysis of violations that occurred from November 2023 to April 2024.

In Jordan, Ajith Sunghay, Head of OHCHR’s office in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, explained that “the pattern of (Israeli) strikes throughout Gaza and the fact they had killed and injured so many people” while also destroying vital infrastructure raises concerns that Israeli forces were intentionally attacking the 
“very basic fabric of Palestinian society”.

“We have been verifying the personal details of those killed in Gaza by strikes, shelling and other conduct of hostilities. Of those fatalities, we have so far found close to 70 per cent to be children and women, indicating a systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law, including distinction and proportionality.”

Climate crisis: Samoa is facing a plastic tide, warns top rights expert

Climate news now, and Samoa – like other Small Pacific Island States – is facing a surging plastic tide, a top independent rights expert has said.

Marcos Orellana, the Special Rapporteur on toxic environments and human rights, warned on Friday that while Samoa is taking measures to ban some plastics, it “cannot keep up with growing amounts of plastic waste”.

The independent rights expert, who does not work for the UN, added that Samoa was “at the receiving end of cheap plastic imports (and) pesticides that are banned in other countries”, along with used cars and tyres.

Samoa simply “does not have financial, technical and human resources to deal adequately” with all the waste being generated, Mr. Orellana insisted, before calling out plastic producers for not doing enough to prevent pollution in the first place.

The latest international negotiations on a legally binding instrument on plastic pollution had taken a “wrong turn”, the rights expert said, maintaining that current international talks risked “shifting responsibility from plastic-producing States to developing States that lack capacity or resources to confront the global plastic scourge”.

Daniel Johnson, UN News.

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