Atrocities are used as a tool to assert control.
Before the UN Security Council, the ICC's deputy prosecutor laid bare what investigators have come to understand as a deliberate, widening campaign of atrocity in Sudan's Darfur — mass executions, systematic rape, and ethnic targeting carried out by the Rapid Support Forces with the calculated logic of strategy rather than the disorder of war. The region, already scarred by genocide allegations two decades prior, is being consumed again, with patterns documented in El Geneina in 2023 now replicating themselves across other towns. A single conviction has been secured, but the architects of the violence — including former president Omar al-Bashir — remain free, and the Court's testimony before the council carried an unspoken question: whether international institutions possess the will to match their documentation with consequence.
- ICC Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan told the UN Security Council that RSF fighters are not merely committing atrocities — they are filming and celebrating them, turning mass murder into deliberate spectacle.
- The violence is not random: the same blueprint of arbitrary detention, mass graves, rape, and ethnic cleansing used in El Geneina in 2023 is now being systematically replicated in El Fasher and spreading to other Darfur towns.
- Hundreds of thousands of civilians, predominantly from non-Arab communities, have been displaced into Chad, while survivors of sexual violence face cultural and security barriers that make even bearing witness a dangerous act.
- The ICC secured a landmark conviction of former Janjaweed leader Ali Kushayb in October, but prosecutors warn that one verdict against the scale of ongoing atrocities does little to break the culture of impunity driving the campaign.
- Senior suspects — including former president Omar al-Bashir — remain at large, and Khan's closing challenge to the Security Council was stark: without high-level arrests, justice for Darfur's victims will remain a hollow promise.
On Monday, the ICC's deputy prosecutor stood before the UN Security Council and described something beyond the disorder of war: an organized, methodical campaign of brutality spreading town by town across Sudan's Darfur region. Nazhat Shameem Khan presented evidence — video, audio, satellite imagery — showing RSF fighters committing mass executions, systematic rape, and ethnic targeting of non-Arab communities, then documenting their own crimes as if in celebration. Her conclusion was unambiguous: these were war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Sudan has been fracturing since April 2023, when the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces — once uneasy partners — turned on each other. Darfur, already haunted by genocide allegations from the early 2000s, became the epicenter. What Khan described to the council was not chaos but strategy: the same patterns of arbitrary detention, mass graves, and sexual violence documented in El Geneina in 2023 were now appearing in El Fasher and spreading further. "This criminality is being repeated in town after town," she warned.
Sexual violence was central to that strategy, deployed as a weapon of control, with survivors facing significant barriers to coming forward. Khan noted the ICC was investigating all parties to the conflict, including the Sudanese Armed Forces, but the weight of her testimony rested on the RSF's systematic campaign. She acknowledged one landmark moment — the October conviction of former Janjaweed leader Ali Kushayb — while cautioning that a single verdict offered little against the scale of ongoing atrocities and the impunity that sustains them.
She closed with a direct challenge: former president Omar al-Bashir and other senior suspects long sought by the Court remain free. Without arrests at the highest level, she said, justice for Darfur's victims would remain hollow. The question left hanging in the council chamber was whether the assembled powers had either the will or the means to answer it.
On Monday, the International Criminal Court's deputy prosecutor stood before the UN Security Council with a stark assessment: the violence consuming Sudan's Darfur region had moved beyond isolated incidents into something far more deliberate and expansive. Nazhat Shameem Khan described a pattern of organized brutality spreading methodically from town to town—mass executions, systematic rape, ethnic targeting—all of it documented, filmed, and in some cases celebrated by those carrying it out. What she was describing amounted to war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Sudan has been fractured since April 2023, when two military forces that had once worked together turned on each other: the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces militia. What started as a power struggle metastasized into something far worse, with Darfur becoming the epicenter of devastation. The region had already endured genocide allegations in the early 2000s; now, old ethnic tensions were being weaponized anew. Khan said the situation had "darkened even further," with civilians subjected to what amounted to collective torture.
The evidence was specific and damning. Video, audio, and satellite imagery showed RSF fighters not merely committing atrocities but documenting them—detaining, mistreating, and executing civilians from non-Arab communities, then desecrating the bodies. In El Fasher, North Darfur's regional capital, which fell to the RSF after a prolonged siege, investigators found patterns that matched earlier documented crimes: arbitrary detention, mass graves, rape used as a weapon of control. Khan said the perpetrators were "celebrating direct executions," turning murder into spectacle.
The same blueprint was being replicated elsewhere. In El Geneina, where 2023 saw some of the war's worst violence, RSF fighters and allied militias had massacred the Massalit community, forcing hundreds of thousands to flee into Chad. Witnesses documented attacks on displacement camps, looting, gender-based violence, and crimes against children. Now that same pattern was appearing in El Fasher and spreading to other towns. "This criminality is being repeated in town after town in Darfur," Khan warned the council. The implication was clear: this was not chaos. It was strategy.
Sexual violence occupied a central place in that strategy. Rape was being deployed as a weapon of war, Khan said, and the ICC had made gender-based crimes a priority in its investigations. Yet survivors faced cultural and security barriers to reporting. The prosecutor acknowledged the need for investigations that were both gender-sensitive and centered on survivors' needs—a recognition that documentation itself required care.
Khan was careful to note that the ICC was also investigating allegations against the Sudanese Armed Forces, emphasizing that all parties to the conflict were bound by international law to protect civilians. But the weight of her testimony fell on the RSF's systematic campaign. She cited one conviction—that of Ali Kushayb, a former Janjaweed militia leader, convicted in October—as a landmark moment. Yet she cautioned that a single conviction meant little against the scale of ongoing atrocities. The sense of impunity, she suggested, was what fueled the violence's continuation.
She closed with a direct challenge to the council: action must be taken against senior suspects long sought by the Court. Former president Omar al-Bashir, former interior minister Ahmad Harun, former defence minister Abdel Raheem Muhammad Hussein—these men remained at large. Without arrests at the highest level, Khan said, justice for Darfur's victims would remain hollow. The question hanging over the council chamber was whether anyone in that room had the will or the power to make it happen.
Citas Notables
The picture that is emerging is appalling: organised, widespread, mass criminality including mass executions.— ICC Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan
This criminality is being repeated in town after town in Darfur. It will continue until this conflict, and the sense of impunity that fuels it, are stopped.— ICC Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
When she says the atrocities are "organized," what does that actually mean? Is this just RSF fighters doing the same terrible things independently, or is there a command structure?
It's the latter. The patterns are too consistent, too replicated across different towns, too deliberately documented. That's not random violence—that's a campaign. The same tactics in El Geneina appearing in El Fasher suggests coordination, planning, intent.
And the filming—why would they document their own crimes?
Partly terror. You film an execution and spread it, you're sending a message to the communities you're targeting. But also impunity. When you're not afraid of consequences, you celebrate. The fact that they're doing this openly tells you something about how little they expect to face justice.
The prosecutor mentioned barriers to survivors reporting. What kind of barriers?
Cultural shame, especially around sexual violence. Fear of retaliation. Displacement—if you've fled to Chad, how do you testify? And in a conflict zone, there's no safe space to speak. The ICC knows this, which is why they're trying to build investigations that don't re-traumatize people.
She cited one conviction but said it meant little. How much does accountability actually matter if the violence keeps spreading?
It matters for the historical record, for survivors' dignity. But you're right—one conviction against hundreds of thousands of victims, against ongoing atrocities, feels almost insulting. The real accountability would be arresting the people at the top. Without that, lower-level fighters know they can keep going.
What happens if those senior suspects are never arrested?
Then the violence likely continues, and Darfur becomes another place where mass atrocities happened and nobody paid. That's what Khan was warning about—not just the immediate human cost, but the precedent it sets.