UN HR body holds special session on Sudan following killing of hundreds in Darfur’s el-Fasher

UN HR body holds special session on Sudan following killing of hundreds in Darfur’s el-Fasher
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The UN’s top human rights body held a one-day special session Friday to highlight hundreds of killings at a hospital in Sudan’s Darfur region and other atrocities committed last month by paramilitary forces fighting the army, Arab News reported.

The Human Rights Council was also debating a draft resolution calling on an existing team of independent experts to carry out an urgent inquiry into the killings and other rights violations in the city of el-Fasher by the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary.

Last month the RSF seized el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, and rampaged through the Saudi Hospital in the city, killing more than 450 people, according to the World Health Organization. RSF fighters went house to house, killing civilians and committing sexual assaults.

The military and the RSF, who were former allies, went to war in 2023. WHO says the fighting has killed at least 40,000 people, and the United Nations says another 12 million have been displaced. Aid groups say the true death toll could be many times higher.

The draft resolution, led by several European countries, offered little in the way of strong new language though it requested a fact-finding team that the council has already created to try to identify those responsible for the crimes in el-Fasher and help bring them to account.

The council, which is made up of 47 UN member countries, does not have the power to force countries or others to comply, but can shine a spotlight on rights violations and help document them for possible use in places like the International Criminal Court.