In the context of “a significant increase in business ViolenceSince October 20th Gezira State In the center of the country, at least 124 civilians were killed, and about 135,000 fled to neighboring states, including 3,200 pregnant women, according to what the United Nations Population Fund, which specializes in… Maternal health And the child, in a statement.
Violent sexual assaults
Quoting numbers Ministry of Health In Gezira State, the Fund reported “preliminary” information from 27 women and girls between the ages of 6 and 60 who were subjected to rape or assault, noting that these cases constitute “a small part of Sexual assaults Violence occurs on a large scale.
The statement quoted Maria, a mother of two sons, as saying, “They (the gunmen) persecuted us, beat us, pointed their weapons at us, and searched our daughters.”
Girls recounted that their brothers, uncles, and fathers provided them with knives, adding, “They told us to kill ourselves if the fighters threatened to rape us.”
Painful testimonies
Survivors said in other testimonies, “Women threw themselves into the… The river To avoid being attacked by armed men,” while “others fled and hid because their families threatened to kill them for the sake of washing away their shame.”
Fatima, a mother of six who does not know what happened to her husband, said, “They beat us like… DogsSo we left. We had nothing, not even bread. We walked for seven days under Sunshine Scorching without eating anything. Some women died on the way.”
Amina (27 years old) was among a group of 21 pregnant women in the last stage who were gathered by a local doctor in a village to help them give birth before fleeing. She had to undergo a caesarean section. “The shootings were so terrifying that I mustered up the courage to leave the village,” she said.
She explained that “only six hours after undergoing the caesarean section, and despite the “wounds that were still fresh and painful,” she continued on her way with her newborn on foot, and then in a “donkey cart” for several days.
