SUDAN: DEATH SENTENCES FOR SIX PARAMILITARIES FOR THE KILLING OF PROTESTERS IN 2019

September 12, 2021:

Six members of a Sudanese paramilitary force were sentenced to death on 5 August 2021 by a court in the central city of Al-Obeid for the deaths of six protesters in 2019, including four school children.
The trial, broadcast on Sudanese television, concerns events that took place during a mass protest in July 2019 against gasoline and bread shortages in Al-Obeid in the North Kordofan region.
The deaths of the protesters had raised a wave of anger in Sudan, and in August 2019, authorities arrested nine paramilitaries from the powerful Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in connection with the violence.
On 5 August, Judge Mohamed Rahma sentenced six of the defendants to death and acquitted two others. The ninth, under the age of 18, was referred to a juvenile court.
During the trial, the judge said that the actions of the paramilitaries had been "unnecessary" and "out of proportion" to the alleged verbal provocations of the protesters.