[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. Res. 559 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

<DOC>






118th CONGRESS
  2d Session
S. RES. 559

Recognizing the actions of the Rapid Support Forces and allied militia 
 in the Darfur region of Sudan against non-Arab ethnic communities as 
                           acts of genocide.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                           February 12, 2024

 Mr. Risch (for himself, Mr. Cardin, Mr. Scott of South Carolina, and 
 Mr. Booker) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to 
                   the Committee on Foreign Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION


 
Recognizing the actions of the Rapid Support Forces and allied militia 
 in the Darfur region of Sudan against non-Arab ethnic communities as 
                           acts of genocide.

Whereas Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the 
        Crime of Genocide (in this preamble referred to as the ``Genocide 
        Convention''), adopted at Paris December 9, 1948, defines genocide as 
        ``any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole 
        or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: 
        (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental 
        harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group 
        conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in 
        whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births 
        within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to 
        another group'';
Whereas the genocide that began in 2003 in Darfur perpetrated by the Government 
        of Sudan and its proxy Janjaweed militia--explicitly targeting the Fur, 
        Zaghawa, and Masalit ethnic communities through mass killings, forced 
        displacement, the razing of villages and cropland, widespread rape, 
        aerial bombings of civilians, and the blocking of humanitarian 
        assistance--killed at least 200,000 civilians and displaced 2,000,000 
        people;
Whereas Congress declared on July 22, 2004, with the passage of Senate 
        Concurrent Resolution 133 (108th Congress) and House Concurrent 
        Resolution 467 (108th Congress) that atrocities occurring in Darfur were 
        genocide, and the administration of President George W. Bush declared 
        genocide in Darfur on September 9, 2004;
Whereas, in 2013, the Government of Sudan, under the administration of the 
        National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) and the command of the 
        Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), formed the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a 
        formal paramilitary force composed primarily of Janjaweed militia;
Whereas Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (commonly known as ``Hemedti''), a Janjaweed 
        militia leader during the genocide in Darfur that began in 2003, served 
        as head of the RSF and became the deputy head of the Transitional 
        Military Council, which took power from President of Sudan Omar al-
        Bashir in 2019, and the deputy chairman of the successor Sovereign 
        Council;
Whereas the underlying conditions that enabled the genocide in Darfur that began 
        in 2003 were never fully addressed or resolved, and the elevation of 
        individuals who served in leadership of the parties responsible for such 
        genocide, including Hemedti and General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan of the 
        SAF, into leadership roles in the transition government in 2019 only 
        heightened the risk of atrocities across Sudan, including genocide in 
        Darfur;
Whereas fighting between the SAF and the RSF broke out in Khartoum on April 15, 
        2023, and quickly spread to Darfur, where the RSF has taken control of 
        four of five regional capitals in Darfur--Nyala, Geneina, Zalingei, and 
        El Daein;
Whereas the reports, including a July 14, 2023, assessment, by the Sudan 
        Conflict Observatory, which is funded by the United States, reveal that 
        actions by the RSF in Darfur, including besieging cities, destroying 
        villages, and committing extrajudicial detentions, killings, and sexual 
        violence against Masalit, Fur, and Zaghawa ethnic groups, mirror the 
        atrocities committed by the Government of Sudan and the Janjaweed 
        militias between 2003 and 2004;
Whereas, on August 16, 2023, CNN issued an investigative report on the June 15, 
        2023, atrocity in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, describing the 
        atrocity as ``one of the most violent incidents in the genocide-scarred 
        Sudanese region's history'', explaining how ``the powerful paramilitary 
        Rapid Support Forces and its allied militias hunted down non-Arab people 
        in various parts of the city . . . reviving a genocidal playbook'', and 
        in which survivors reported that identifying as Masalit ``was a death 
        sentence'';
Whereas, on November 3, 2023, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner 
        for Human Rights stated, ``We are deeply alarmed by reports that women 
        and girls are being abducted and held in inhuman, degrading slave-like 
        conditions in areas controlled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in 
        Darfur'';
Whereas, on November 14, 2023, the United Nations Special Adviser on the 
        Prevention of Genocide, Alice Wairimu Nderitu, expressed extreme concern 
        with the ``serious allegations of mass killings'' in Ardamata, which 
        ``may constitute acts of genocide'', citing reports that the violence 
        killed more than 800 people and displaced 8,000 Sudanese individuals to 
        Chad;
Whereas, on December 6, 2023, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken determined 
        that, since the fighting between the SAF and the RSF began on April 15, 
        2023, Sudan has experienced war crimes, crimes against humanity, and 
        ethnic cleansing in ``haunting echoes of the genocide that began almost 
        20 years ago in Darfur'', including Masalit civilians being ``hunted 
        down and left for dead in the streets, their homes set on fire, and told 
        that there is no place in Sudan for them'';
Whereas a December 15, 2023, Reuters special investigative report detailed the 
        targeted killing of Masalit men and boys by the RSF, about which an 
        emergency protection officer for the United Nations High Commissioner 
        for Refugees explained that ``the objective of the killings seems to be 
        the elimination of future fighters as well as the line of ancestry of a 
        specific ethnic group'', referring to the Masalit people;
Whereas the RSF has killed Masalit political and traditional leaders in El-
        Geneina, West Darfur, including Khamis Abdullah Abbakar, the Governor of 
        West Darfur, and Farsha Mohamed Arbab, a prominent leader of the Masalit 
        Sultanate;
Whereas there is significant evidence of widespread, systematic actions against 
        the non-Arab ethnic communities of Darfur, including the Masalit people, 
        committed by the RSF and allied militia that meet one or more of the 
        criteria under Article II of the Genocide Convention, including--

    (1) killing members of the non-Arab ethnic communities in Darfur in 
mass killings of civilians, including summary executions in the streets and 
shootings of civilians fleeing across the Wadi Kaja river and to the Chad 
border, targeted killings of men and boys, targeted killings of Masalit 
leaders, and burials in mass graves;

    (2) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of such 
communities, including through extrajudicial detention, torture and 
beatings, extortion, sexual and gender-based violence, mass rape, sexual 
slavery, and forced displacement; and

    (3) deliberately inflicting on such communities conditions of life 
calculated to bring about their physical destruction in whole or in part, 
including the annihilation of villages, targeted attacks on marketplaces 
and schools, widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure and 
telecommunication, the looting of homes and hospitals, assaults on camps 
for displaced persons, the destruction of humanitarian facilities, the 
killing of aid workers, and restrictions on humanitarian aid and access; 
and

Whereas credible descriptions of the RSF's objective of elimination of the line 
        of ancestry of the non-Arab tribes of Darfur, survivors' statements that 
        identifying as Masalit is a death sentence, and reports that the RSF 
        made clear that there is no place in Sudan for the Masalit, against the 
        backdrop of the prior genocide in Darfur, evince a specific intent on 
        the part of the RSF to destroy the Masalit and other non-Arab ethnic 
        groups in Darfur in whole or in substantial part: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the Senate--
            (1) condemns atrocities, including those that amount to the 
        genocide, being committed by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and 
        allied militias against the Masalit people and other non-Arab 
        ethnic groups in Darfur, and the roles of the RSF and Sudanese 
        Armed Forces (SAF) in perpetrating atrocities, humanitarian 
        catastrophe, and the destruction of Sudan;
            (2) calls for an immediate end to the war and all violence 
        and atrocities in Sudan;
            (3) urges the Government of the United States--
                    (A) to take urgent steps work with the 
                international community, including through multilateral 
                fora, to establish means to protect civilians, 
                including by establishing safe zones and humanitarian 
                corridors, enforcing the United Nations Security 
                Council arms embargo on Darfur, and brokering a 
                comprehensive ceasefire and disarmament of the warring 
                parties in Sudan;
                    (B) to support the consistent and transparent 
                documentation of atrocities and genocidal acts in Sudan 
                by instituting a mechanism that will, to the greatest 
                extent possible, publicly release such documentation on 
                a consistent and regular basis;
                    (C) to immediately identify mechanisms through 
                which to fund local, community-based organizations that 
                are currently providing humanitarian assistance to the 
                Sudanese people in conflict affected areas that 
                traditional implementing partners cannot reach, 
                including for the delivery of food, medical aid, and 
                shelter to individuals impacted by the war in Sudan; 
                and
                    (D) to regularly review and update the atrocities 
                determination for Sudan;
            (4) supports tribunals and international criminal 
        investigations to hold the RSF and allied militias accountable 
        for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide; and
            (5) calls on the Atrocity Prevention Task Force to conduct 
        a comprehensive review of its efforts to prevent, analyze, and 
        respond to atrocities in Sudan, in alignment with the 2022 
        United States Strategy to Anticipate, Prevent, and Respond to 
        Atrocities.
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