Ongoing atrocities fueled by rampant impunity and an accountability gap across Sudan require comprehensive justice responses two decades after the United Nations Security Council referred the situation in Darfur to the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor, Human Rights Watch said today.
On March 31, 2005, the Security Council adopted resolution 1593, giving the ICC a mandate over crimes against humanity, war crimes, and genocide committed in Darfur from July 2002 onward. ICC investigations led to the opening of several cases addressing crimes committed in the region from 2003-2013. But today, nearly two years after the current fighting began in April 2023, the ICC's mandate remains limited to Darfur even as serious abuses are being committed across Sudan. The UN-backed Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan and the African Commission for Human and Peoples' Rights-mandated Joint Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan, are international and regional mechanisms mandated to investigate, but not prosecute, current violations committed across Sudan.
"The warring parties have trapped the Sudanese people once again in an impunity-fueled cycle of violence, committing horrific atrocities and leading to the world's worst humanitarian crisis," said Liz Evenson, international justice director at Human Rights Watch. "Governments should commit publicly to explore all avenues to close the accountability gap in Sudan, so that victims of today's crimes will not have to wait another two decades for justice."
Since the fighting erupted on April 15, 2023, between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), both warring parties have committed war crimes, such as executing detainees and mutilating their bodies, and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, including in Khartoum, North Darfur, Gezira, and South and West Kordofan states, Human Rights Watch research has found.
The RSF has committed crimes against humanity, including in an ethnic cleansing campaign in West Darfur in 2023, and widespread acts of sexual violence in areas of Khartoum, the capital, since 2023. The RSF and allied militias also have raped scores of women and girls in the context of sexual slavery in South Kordofan since September 2023.
The ICC prosecutor, in January 2025, signaled that his office expects to request arrest warrants based on investigations into crimes committed since April 2023 in West Darfur. The 2005 Security Council referral limits the court's jurisdiction to Darfur.
In its September and October 2024 reports, the UN fact-finding mission documented international crimes across the country and called for the Security Council to expand the jurisdiction of the ICC to cover all of Sudan. It also urged governments to use all available international justice options, including the establishment of an internationalized judicial mechanism for Sudan and universal jurisdiction prosecutions before domestic courts to complement the ICC's work. The fact-finding mission also called on Sudan to cooperate with the ICC.
Other countries should use this anniversary to pledge publicly to work together to implement the fact-finding mission's recommendations and ensure stepped-up justice responses for the country, Human Rights Watch said. Governments should make sure they speak at the highest level to the need for focused efforts on accountability at key upcoming meetings, including the European Union's April 14, 2025, meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council and the April 15 London high-level conference on Sudan. Accountability efforts should center Sudanese voices and can draw from international experience with national and international efforts as in Ukraine and Syria.
States should also give their full support for evidence preservation and documentation of today's crimes, to lay the groundwork for accountability. This should include support for the UN fact-finding mission and the African Commission for Human and Peoples' Rights-mandated Joint Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan. States should ensure that these bodies have the necessary political and financial resources to carry out their mandates, effective coordination and cooperation between them and with the ICC, and access to Sudan and neighboring countries.
Governments should also increase financial and technical support to civil society organizations to document human rights violations and campaign and strategize for justice through Sudanese civil society-led initiatives. This includes urgently filling the gap created by funding cuts by the United States government, and condemning the warring parties' targeting of human rights defenders and lawyers because of their role in documenting human rights abuses.
A verdict is pending in an ICC trial of former Janjaweed militia leader, Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman (Ali Kosheib), on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Darfur in 2003-04 and 2013. Twenty years after the Security Council referral, however, the Kosheib trial stands alone.
Following Omar al-Bashir's ouster as Sudan's leader in April 2019, the transitional government-a power-sharing agreement between civilian and military groups-had a window of opportunity to ensure accountability for past rights abuses. The transitional government took small steps on accountability. But it failed to prioritize accountability for serious rights abuses, and nascent legal reforms were cut short following the 2021 military takeover.
Al-Bashir and two former Sudanese leaders wanted by the ICC have yet to be handed over. The Sudanese authorities should immediately surrender al-Bashir and those wanted by the court, Human Rights Watch said.
ICC member countries should ensure that the court has the required resources to carry out its work. All UN member states should urge the Security Council to back the ICC's mandate in Darfur, including by enforcing the court's findings of noncooperation in arrests, Human Rights Watch said. States should also call on the government of Sudan to accept the ICC's jurisdiction across the country.
The 20th anniversary of the Security Council's referral is a reminder of the ICC's essential role as a court of last resort and comes amid an open challenge to the court's independence. On February 6, 2025, US President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order that authorizes asset freezes and entry bans on ICC officials and others supporting the court's work in investigations the United States opposes, and applied these sanctions to the court's prosecutor, Karim Khan. US sanctions are likely to have a wide impact on the court's work, including in the Darfur situation. The United States is not a party to the ICC, but has supported the ICC's work in Darfur.
ICC member countries should reaffirm their commitment to defend the court, its officials, and those cooperating with it from any political interference and pressure. The European Union should urgently impose its blocking statute to mitigate the effects of US sanctions, Human Rights Watch said.
"The Darfur referral 20 years ago showed what the international community could do to support justice as an essential element of international peace and security," Evenson said. "Governments should draw on the experience of the intervening decades in pursuing creative pathways to justice at national and international levels to follow up on that 20-year-old promise."
