Al-Sinoot: Rhino – Twenty-eight civilians, including women and children, were killed early Monday morning when the Sudanese army targeted a shelter for displaced persons in the city of Al-Sinnut in West Kordofan state with a Bayraktar drone. The strike targeted the veterinary unit building in the city, which was sheltering displaced persons who had fled the cities of El Obeid and El Rahad and other areas of conflict in Kordofan, according to eyewitnesses from the city who spoke to the press.

The bombing killed 28 people, including nine women and 12 children, in addition to a number of men, while others were injured, some critically. The victims were sleeping inside the building when the strike occurred.

Mohammed Siddiq, a human rights activist, said in press statements that “targeting sites sheltering displaced civilians is a gross violation of international humanitarian law, which obliges all parties to the conflict to respect the principle of distinction between civilians and combatants, and the principle of proportionality in the use of force.”

He added that “the Sudanese army has been targeting civilians in Kordofan and Darfur amid suspicious international silence,” considering that “this silence has encouraged the commission of more massacres against civilians in the region.”

He continued: “Any attack that directly targets civilians, or is carried out without taking sufficient precautions to verify the nature of the target, amounts to a war crime under the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.””