International NGOs call for a UNSC resolution to protect Sudan's most vulnerable

We, the heads of over 50 human rights and humanitarian organizations are coming together to
sound the alarm about Sudan, where a disaster is unfolding before our eyes. With fighting
continuing across the country, brutal sexual violence rising, widespread deliberate and
indiscriminate attacks on civilians, and journalists and human rights defenders being silenced,
the country is no longer at the precipice of mass atrocities – it has fallen over the edge.

Since April, when open hostilities broke out in Sudan’s capital, more than five million people
have been forced to flee their homes and hundreds of thousands of others may soon be forced
to join them. Many are now living in camps with limited access to humanitarian assistance, few
educational opportunities for their children, and almost no psychosocial support to help them
cope with their traumatic experiences.

Inside Sudan, over 20 million people, 42 percent of Sudan’s population, now face acute food
insecurity and 6 million are just a step away from famine. At least 498 children have died from
hunger. Clinics and doctors have come under fire throughout the country, putting 80 percent of
the country’s major hospitals out of service.

Hate speech, especially language urging the targeting of communities based on the color of
their skin, is always alarming. But with an increasingly fractured social fabric, some fighters
targeting civilians based on their ethnicity, and accounts from sexual violence survivors in
Darfur who heard their rapists tell them that we hope you bear “our” babies – we fear the
worst.

Twenty years after the horrors of Darfur shocked our conscience, we are failing to meet the
moment.

Thus far, mediation efforts have not deterred Sudan’s warring parties from continuing to
commit egregious abuses. We urge a more unified approach that better represents the voices
and perspectives of Sudan’s civilians, including women, youth, and representatives from the
historically marginalized “periphery.”

We are committed to working together to urge more aid for, more solidarity with, and greater
attention to the needs of Sudan’s civilians. The United Nations humanitarian appeal remains
woefully underfunded – at about 25 percent of what is needed – and Sudan’s warring parties
continue to undermine efforts to deliver aid safely. Donors should step up humanitarian
funding, both for local and international organizations who are providing indispensable
assistance in Sudan and neighboring countries.

The costs of inaction are mounting.

The UN Security Council should move from talk to action and begin negotiations to pass a
resolution that challenges the climate of impunity, reiterates that international law requires
providing safe, unhindered humanitarian access, and redirects international efforts to better
protect Sudan’s most vulnerable. The consequences of not acting are too grave to imagine.

Signatories

African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies, Mossaad Mohamed Ali, Executive Director

Africans for the Horn of Africa, Stella Ndirangu, Coordinator

Amnesty International, Agnes Callamard, Secretary General

Association of Sudanese-American Professors in America (ASAPA), Beckry Abdel-Magid, Secretary

Atrocities Watch, Dismas Nkunda, CEO

Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, Bahey El Din Hassan, Director

Carter Center, Paige Alexander, CEO

Center for Peace Building and Democracy in Liberia (CEPEBUD-Liberia), Florence N. Flomo, Executive Director

Committee to Protect Journalists, Jodie Ginsberg, President

Consortium on Gender, Security and Human Rights, Carol Cohn, Director

Darfur Diaspora Association Group in the United Kingdom, Abdallah Idriss, Director

Darfur Women Action Group, Niemat Ahmadi, Founder and President

DefendDefenders, Hassan Shire, Executive Director

EG Justice, Tutu Alicante, Executive Director

Freedom House, Michael J. Abramowitz, President

Genocide Alert, Gregor Hoffman, Chairman

George W. Bush Institute, David Kramer, Executive Director

Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, Savita Pawnday, Executive Director

Global Survivors Fund, President, Dennis Mukwege

GOAL, Siobhán Walsh, CEO

HIAS, Mark Hetfield, President & CEO

HUDO Centre, Bushra Gamar, Executive Director

Human Rights Watch, Tirana Hassan, Executive Director

iACT, Sara-Christine Dallain, Executive Director

Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention at Binghamton University, Kerry Whigham, Co-Director

InterAction, Anne Lynam Goddard, Interim President and CEO

International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Eleonore Morel, CEO

International Rescue Committee, David Miliband, President & CEO

Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights, Felice Gaer, Director

Legal Action Worldwide, Antonia Mulvey, Founder and Executive Director

MADRE, Yifat Susskind, Executive Director

Mercy Corps, Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, Chief Executive Officer

Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies at Concordia University, Kyle Matthews,
Executive Director

Never Again Coalition, Lauren Fortgang, Director

No Business with Genocide, Simon Billenness, Director

Nobel Women’s Initiative, Maria Butler, Executive Director

Nonviolent Peaceforce, Tiffany Easthom, Executive Director

Norwegian Refugee Council, Jan Egeland, Secretary General

Open Society Foundations, Mark Malloch-Brown, President

OutRight International, Maria Sjödin, Executive Director

Physicians for Human Rights, Saman Zia-Zarifi, Executive Director

Plan International, Stephen Omollo, CEO

Project Expedite Justice, Cynthia Tai, Executive Director

Public International Law & Policy Group, Paul R. Williams, President

Refugees International, Jeremy Konyndyk, President

Regional Centre for Training and Development of Civil Society, Mutaal Girshab, Director General

Society for Threatened Peoples, Roman Kühn, Director

Sudan Transparency and Policy Tracker, Suliman Baldo, Executive Director

Sudanese American Public Affairs Association, Fareed Zein, Board Chairman

The Sentry, John Prendergast, Co-Founder

Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition (TASSC), Aymen Tabir, Executive Director

Vital Voices, Alyse Nelson, President & CEO

World Federalist Movement Canada, Alexandre MacIsaac, Executive Director

World Federalist Movement/Institute for Global Policy (WFM/IGP), Amy Oloo, Consulting Executive
Director