A doctor in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, working to support the city’s many survivors of sexual violence recounted the ordeal of a woman who was raped by several members of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) who came to her clinic. “When the woman found out she was pregnant, her husband expelled her and took away their children. She was left on the streets.” The doctor said that the survivor came seeking an abortion, with the hope that it would help her get her children back, “but the director at the hospital did not agree to the procedure. We referred her to another hospital, but they couldn’t do the procedure because they didn't have an obstetrician. After the pregnancy exceeded four months, we had to offer her psychological support so that she could accept the condition. It was the only option available to us,” said the doctor.

Conflict broke out in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, on April 15, 2023, between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), an independent military force, and rapidly spread to other parts of the country. The capital city has witnessed intense fighting ever since.

The parties have used explosive weapons in civilian areas across Khartoum, indiscriminately shelled, and in the case of SAF, used air-dropped bombs in civilian neighbourhoods and against essential infrastructure, leaving the capital in ruins.

The RSF have entrenched themselves in Khartoum’s residential areas, where they have occupied homes, businesses, and essential infrastructure, notably healthcare facilities. In areas over which they exercise control, the RSF have committed serious violations of international humanitarian law, including widespread sexual and gender-based violence, as well as unlawful detention and confinement of civilians, and pillage.

This report documents widespread conflict-related sexual violence in Khartoum and its sister cities of Bahri and Omdurman since the conflict’s onset as witnessed by service providers to survivors of that sexual violence. It finds that warring parties have subjected women and girls, from ages 9 through to at least 60, to widespread sexual violence, including rape and gang rape. Women and girls have also been subjected to forced marriage and child marriage. Men and boys have also been victims of sexual violence. It describes the impacts of sexual violence on survivors including health impacts. It also details the lack of emergency post-rape health care, psychosocial support, and other services due to warring parties’ attacks on health care, healthcare workers and local responders, restrictions on civilians’ movement, ongoing fighting in populated areas, and the willful obstruction of aid.

Report by the Human Rights Watch