Khartoum: Rhino – The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on Wednesday denounced the decision issued yesterday by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to impose sanctions on its commander, General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, based on Executive Order (E.O.) 14098 on sanctioning certain individuals who destabilize Sudan and undermine the goal of democratic transition. It also denounced the U.S. State Department’s decision alleging that it committed genocide in Sudan.
The RSF responded to the US decisions in a statement on Wednesday, saying: “The decisions issued yesterday by the current outgoing administration are, by all accounts, regrettable and unfair, and are of course purely political decisions, taken without a thorough and independent investigation into the party responsible for the outbreak of this catastrophic war and the accompanying violations committed by various parties during the duration of the ongoing war in Sudan. This war was ignited by the leadership of the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Islamists, who declared this repeatedly in the weeks leading up to the outbreak of the war, and the evidence proving this is available to everyone, as they threatened to ignite the war to block the road to ending the October 25th coup and returning to the path of democratic transition.
The statement added: “It is surprising that the sanctions decision was issued under the executive order on destabilization and undermining the democratic transition, but it does not punish the military leadership of the army that insists on continuing the October 25th coup, in which we participated, but we retreated from it since day one, and we worked sincerely, honestly and consistently to end it, and we worked to support the framework agreement that ends the coup and restores the democratic path until the military leadership started the war, and we resisted it and prevented their full access to power as they intended and planned.
The RSF continued in its statement: “The displacement of 12 million Sudanese people happened because of the war, and the responsibility for that lies with those who started this war, not those who confronted its instigators for the sake of civilian rule and in exercise of the legitimate right of self-defense in religions, morals and laws. As for the famine, it is known, according to UN reports and the statements of the current US administration officials themselves more than once, that the armed forces and the “Port Sudan gang” that controls them are the ones who caused it by obstructing the passage of humanitarian aid and preventing it from entering the RSF-controlled areas; the army leadership even rejected all peace initiatives, including the US invitation to negotiate in the Geneva platform”.
“It is also surprising that the resolution indicates that the RSF engaged in a brutal conflict with the armed forces to control Sudan, while the truth is that what engaged in a brutal conflict to control Sudan is the army leadership and the Islamists who control it and the military institution.
Regarding the allegations of genocide, the statement stated: “The State Department’s decision that the RSF committed genocide in Sudan was wrong. It did not specifically mention the group against which the genocide was committed, nor where this genocide, which is committed according to the 1948 Convention against a specific national, ethnic, racial or religious group, took place, as the decision refers in this regard to the Sudanese people, of which the RSF fighters and supporters are an integral part.
Genocide is a serious crime, and the previous US administration should not deal with it at this level of generalization, which confirms that this decision was taken for political considerations that have nothing to do with the legal foundations related to genocide in terms of definition and proof.
The statement described the US decisions as selective, and added: “The decisions issued are selective decisions that will not help achieve any of the fundamental goals that should be focused on, namely reaching a political solution and conducting a comprehensive historical justice process that leads to ending historical injustice in Sudan, doing justice to the victims, and making and building a sustainable peace that achieves social justice.
(The resolution selectively ignored the egregious violations committed by the Sudanese Armed Forces on a large scale with aerial bombing, which has killed more than 4,000 civilians, the arrest of anti-war civilians in various parts of Sudan, the starvation and torture of detainees, and the violation of the no-fly zone in Darfur with continuous aerial bombardment on the civilian population in various cities in the region).
The RSF said that the US Treasury Department’s decisions put the cart before the horse, rewarding the party that refuses to stop the war and punishing the advocates of unity and peace, which “not only complicates the current situation, but also makes it difficult to achieve comprehensive peace in our country, serves only the Islamists and the old regime in Sudan, and will inevitably cast a negative shadow on the role of the United States as a mediator, a role that, from our point of view, is very important.”
The statement stated that RSF commander has played a pivotal role in the removal of the Bashir regime, through the failure of the October 25 coup, supporting the political process and confronting the current war ignited by the remnants, in addition to playing a major role in reconciliation between tribes and fighting hate speech, and working with all his energy to restore the democratic path in our country and stand against the army leadership determined to continue in power by force.
RSF reiterated its declared position since the beginning of this war, which is to end the injustice and historical centralized hegemony in Sudan, and said that it will not allow the dysfunctional political and economic conditions to continue, for which the Sudanese people in marginalized areas are paying a heavy price, calling for ending the war by addressing its root causes, which are the structural imbalances in the state through a comprehensive political solution that achieves a just peace and leads to legal, political, social, and economic justice.
