ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants over accusations of Darfur atrocities
ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants over accusations of Darfur atrocities
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Karim Khan says civilians being targeted and communities destroyed in western region of Sudan. The prosecutor for the international criminal court has said he is seeking arrest warrants for people accused of atrocities in Sudan’s Darfur region, where the US and others have determined that a paramilitary group and its allies have perpetrated genocide.
![[Burnt-out vehicles in a marketplace.]](https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/dc65d312e3a1633f7f90378285a34c16d2dd2789/0_75_3000_1800/master/3000.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none)
Karim Khan told the UN security council in New York: “Criminality is accelerating in Darfur. Civilians are being targeted, women and girls are subjected to sexual violence, and entire communities are left in destruction. “This is not just an assessment; it is a hard-edged analysis based on verified evidence.”.
Khan said ICC lawyers had made material progress by interviewing witnesses who had fled Sudan. Sudan plunged into conflict in mid-April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between its military and paramilitary leaders broke out in the capital, Khartoum, and spread to other regions, including the vast western Darfur region.
Two decades ago, Darfur became synonymous with genocide and war crimes, particularly by the notorious Janjaweed Arab militias, against populations that identify as central or east African. Up to 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes.
Khan said there were very clear echoes now of what happened 20 years ago. “The pattern of crimes, the perpetrators, the parties, tracked very closely with the same protagonists, the same targeted groups as existed in 2003,” he said. “It’s the same communities, the same groups suffering, a new generation suffering the same hell that has been endured by other generations of Darfuris, and this is tragic.”.
