More than 500 people may have been tortured or starved to death and then buried in a secret mass grave north of Khartoum, according to evidence seen by the Guardian.
A visit to a base belonging to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) shortly after it was retaken by the Sudanese military found a previously unknown detention centre, with manacles hanging from doors, apparent punishment chambers and bloodstains on the floor. Accounts from people held at the detention centre describe being repeatedly tortured by their captors.
Nearby was a large burial site with at least 550 unmarked graves, many of them freshly dug and a number apparently containing multiple bodies.
The site is the biggest makeshift burial ground found in Sudan during its civil war and, if confirmed, would make this one of the worst war crimes of Sudan’s brutal conflict.
People rescued from the detention centre at the base’s southern perimeter, about 40 miles (70km) north of the capital, Khartoum, said that many had died inside and were believed to be buried nearby.
Examination of survivors by doctors found myriad signs of torture and concluded they were being starved.
The RSF took over the base, close to the village of Garri, as a command and training centre after fighting began with the Sudanese military almost two years ago. Satellite images and military sources confirm that no graves were present at the location before the war started on 15 April 2023.
The conflict has caused one of the world’s worst famines in decades, killed tens of thousands of people and forced more than 14 million people to leave their homes.
Human Rights Watch (HRW), which has investigated abuses throughout Sudan during the war, said the detention centre site could constitute “one of the largest atrocity crime scenes discovered in Sudan since the war started”, and called for UN war crime investigators to be given access.
Dr Hosham al-Shekh, who examined 135 men who were found there after the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) recaptured the site in late January, said clinical evidence of torture and chronic malnutrition was widespread.
Shekh told the Guardian that the men – all of whom were civilians – were so traumatised when they were discovered that many could not speak.
“When we got there, they couldn’t even walk out. We had to carry them out. They had marks of being severely beaten, tortured,” he said. “Some of them were badly injured from the torture.
“Some of them had been shot in the leg with a bullet. They were beaten with sticks which left marks: clean straight scars from being beaten. All of them were tortured.”
One man was beaten so frequently by RSF guards that he adopted a prolonged foetal position to protect himself.
“They beat me in the morning and at night, they discriminated against me. I got so used to sitting with my knees tucked up that now I cannot straighten my legs to walk,” he said in a statement to Sudanese military medical staff.
The findings raise questions over the credibility of the RSF, coming days after it signed a political charter in Kenya to establish a parallel Sudanese government in areas it controls.
Satellite images of the base confirm that the graves appeared only after the war began and after the RSF occupied the site. An image taken weeks after the war began shows no trace of burial mounds beside a single-track road on the base.
Another image of the same location, captured a year later on 25 May 2024, reveals a significant number of mounds stretching over a distance of about 200 metres.
Capt Jalal Abaker, of the Sudanese military, said he had served on the Garri base up to the outbreak of war in 2023 and said there was no burial site then. “I was there until Ramadan that year [22 March to 20 April 2023],” he said. “There was no cemetery.”
Sgt Mohammed Amin, who is now stationed at Garri, said: “All the bodies buried there died on the base.”
Shekh added that survivors talked of other captives dying. “A lot of them told me that a lot had passed away inside. Many, they said, died because of the torture.”
A senior Sudanese army officer, Col Bashir Tamil, said detainees were found with their hands and feet tied together. “They were in a very bad condition with marks on their bodies and injuries,” he added.
Jean-Baptiste Gallopin, at HRW’s crisis, conflict and arms division, said it was “vital” that the authorities in control of the base treated it as a potential war crime site and made “immediate efforts to secure, collect and safeguard evidence that may be critical for accountability efforts”.
The site, so far, appears to be fully preserved with no public access with the Sudanese military protecting the location to safeguard evidence. International mass grave experts hope independent analysts will be allowed access to the site.
Many of the conflict’s most notorious atrocities have occurred in the western region of Darfur, with the RSF and allied Arab militias accused of ethnic cleansing. Earlier this year the US accused the paramilitary group of genocide.
The international criminal court is investigating abuses in Darfur. Evidence of the crimes against humanity uncovered by the Guardian are being passed to the ICC prosecutor.
The Sudanese army is also accused of committing serious atrocities against civilians, with its leaders sanctioned by the US.
Military sources believe that the RSF never expected the detention centre and burial ground near Garri to be found. Until recently, the group occupied so much territory in the region that it may have believed the site was secure from attack.
The RSF has been contacted for comment. When accused of abuses in the past, the group has responded by forwarding a code of conduct banning mistreatment of detainees and saying it had a committee to investigate abuses and prosecute those responsible.
Source: theguardian.com
