US action urged as mass graves found in Sudan

SUDAN activists yesterday called on the United States and the international community to intervene in a region of Sudan inaccessible to outsiders, after a US group released satellite photos of what they said appear to be mass graves.

The Satellite Sentinel Project images show what appear to be freshly-dug sites in South Kordofan state, where Sudan’s Arab military has been targeting a black ethnic minority loyal to the military of the newly independent Republic of South Sudan. A witness told the project that he saw 100 bodies or more put into one of the pits.

“The DigitalGlobe satellite images contain many of the details and hallmarks of the mass atrocities described by at least five eyewitnesses to the alleged killings,” said Nathaniel A Raymond, of the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, which analyses the project’s images.

Fighting broke out in the region on June 5. Neither the UN, outside aid groups nor journalists have access to the region, raising fears that more violence is being carried out than is known.

Samuel Totten, a genocide scholar at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, said that it is “imperative” that a team of investigators from The Hague-based International Criminal Court travel to the graves quickly to ascertain who the dead are in the graves, how many people were killed, and in what manner.

“It is imperative member nations of the United Nations act now in a timely, efficient and effective manner to enter South Kordofan in order to ward off any more mass killings,” Totten said. He urged the establishment of a no-fly zone.

A spokesman for Sudan’s ruling party denied the project’s allegations and said the area is accessible to observers, though aid groups say it is not.

“The evidence demonstrates beyond a reasonable doubt there are mass graves in Kadugli,” said Reeves. “In short, these accounts strongly suggest a carefully orchestrated campaign of ethnically targeted destruction, and a follow-up effort to hide the evidence from international witnesses.”

The satellite group said three excavated areas measuring about 26 meters (yards) by 5 meters (yards) are visible near a school in the town of Kadugli. The group said that an eyewitness reported seeing 100 bodies or more put into one of the pits on June 8.

After the violence broke out, the UN said at least 73,000 people fled the region. Many of the displaced are ethnic Nuba who have long been marginalised. They are mostly seeking shelter in nearby communities or hiding out in the Nuba Mountains where they have no access to medical assistance, food and clean water.