women and girls. The attackers taunted them, saying: “You slaves, we have chased you away, El
Geneina is now Arab land, not yours.”
In El Geneina attacks, I lost two of my uncles. Our family home was completely looted and
destroyed. My extended family was displaced to refugee camps in Chad by July 2023.
Throughout the attacks and up to now, I have remained in regular contact with my family,
although we have lost many close relatives. No any kind of intervention made by the military
(SAF) or police as the military kept themselves in Ardamata garrison while police fled to Chad
in civilian clothes.
There was slogan used for long time by the perpetrators towards Masalit “either we enslave
them or chase them away”. The main reason is the land and to eliminate Masalit in order to
secure their (Arab) stay with no counter-fighting from them (Masalit), for this reason Arabs kill
the Masalit males indifferently young or old.”42
Haroun, an active lawyer from El Geneina witnessed the conflict of 15 April 2023 said:
“The fighting began on April 16, 2023, and continued for two months. During this period, the
RSF was attacking the Masalit and some African tribes but the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF)
did not provide protection. The attackers’ goal was to seize the land of the Masalit. One of the
soldiers stood in front of the house of Sultan (of the Masalit) and said: “From now on, there is no
Masalit land; it is Arab land’’43 During the repeated attacks, the attackers used racist slurs such
as ’slave’, ’ambai‘, and ’Nuba’. They killed even children and patients inside the hospital.
After two months of continuous violence, most of the Masalit civilians decided to flee from El
Geneina toward Ardamata. However, at Al-Naseem Bridge and Kaja Valley (Wadi Kaja), they
faced new attacks by RSF and many people were killed and others were swept away by the
floodwaters of Wadi Kaja. Those who managed to reach Chad now suffer from psychological
trauma.
During the conflict in El Geneina, many people were killed, others were detained inside metal
containers, some died inside while others were buried alive in mass graves in west of El
Geneina. The civilians, especially the Masalit in El Geneina, were questioning why the Sudanese
42
43
Interview with Ibrahim, HUDO Centre office, Kampala, 29th September 2025.
(230) Announcement before Masalit Sultan's house - YouTube (the video is in Arabic)
24
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