U.N.-backed investigators say Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces have carried out a campaign in the city of el-Fasher in the Darfur region that shows "hallmarks of genocide" against non-Arab communities. The fact-finding mission says the group inflicted mass killings and starvation-like siege conditions that targeted the Zaghawa and Fur people. U.N. officials say thousands of civilians were killed and many others disappeared after the city fell to the paramilitary forces in late October. The team's report describes executions, rape, torture, abductions and selective targeting of women and girls. It said the violence looks planned, not chaotic. It calls for accountability and stronger civilian protection as the war spreads.
The U.N. migration agency tells The Associated Press that the number of internally displaced people in Sudan has reached more than 10 million as war drives many from their homes. The total number of refugees and internally displaced means that more than a quarter of Sudan's population of 47 million has fled. More than 2 million people have been driven abroad, mostly to neighboring Chad, South Sudan and Egypt. Sudan's conflict between the military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces began last year. More than 14,000 people have been killed and the surviving population is near famine.
