Scotland Yard given dossier on Sudan atrocities

Scotland Yard has received a dossier of evidence documenting myriad alleged war crimes committed by a paramilitary group during the conflict in Sudan, reports The Guardian. Lawyers have submitted a 142-page file of evidence to the war crimes unit of the Metropolitan police containing details of numerous atrocities perpetrated by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Compiled by a London-based team of barristers specialising in international law, it documents killings, torture and mass rape. It has been drawn up to support global efforts to hold perpetrators accountable and the lawyers have requested that the Met unit – part of the force’s counter-terrorism command known as SO15 – reviews the dossier before passing it to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to assist investigations into RSF atrocities in Darfur, in the west of Sudan. Now into its third year, the catastrophic war between the RSF and the Sudanese military has prompted the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis, killed at least 150 00 people and forced 12m from their homes. The lawyers said the documents, given to the Met on Monday, offer evidence that the RSF’s leadership are responsible for repeated war crimes, focusing on the legal principle of ‘command responsibility’ – that commanders knew or ought to have known about the atrocities committed by their troops.

Former international judge Sir Howard Morrison described the dossier’s weight of evidence as ‘compelling’. The novel approach through the highly regarded offices of SO15 adds great impetus to the potential accountability of those responsible for the atrocities that have been visited upon numerous victims in Darfur,’ Morrison said. The lead lawyer, Lucia Brieskova, added: ‘We believe this submission will contribute to the fight against impunity suffered by many in Darfur in Sudan.’ The case was instructed by a Sudanese pro-democracy supporter, whom The Guardian is not naming for security reasons. It comes as the International Court of Justice is expected to deliver a verdict on whether the United Arab Emirates can plausibly be found ‘complicit in the commission of genocide’ by arming the RSF in Sudan’s civil war. The case was brought by Sudan who said the UAE has been arming the RSF with the aim of wiping out the non-Arab Masalit population of west Darfur. The UAE has said the case was a cynical publicity stunt.

Full report in The Guardian