The health ministry in Sudan’s Blue Nile regional state has confirmed that ongoing tribal clashes in the area between the Hausa and Berti tribes have left 105 people dead and 291 injured over the past week (https://www.ansa.it/sito/notizie/mondo/africa/2022/07/20/sudan-105-morti-in-conflitto-tribale-in-una-settimana_f7e3adac-88cd-4f49-b06d-c63e9837a57d.html).
The violence, which began last July 14 following the killing of a Hausa tribesman, has spread over the week to several villages in the region, forcing Governor Ahmed El-Omda Badi to decree a curfew in the villages of Damazin and Roseiris (https://www.agenzianova.com/news/sudan-sale-a-105-morti-e-291-feriti-il-bilancio-delle-violenze-tribali-nel-nilo-azzurro/).
The Sudanese government has deployed Rapid Support Forces units under the command of General Dagalo to the area, but they are accused by opposition political figures from the Forces for Freedom and Change grouping of fomenting the violence in order to consolidate the dominance of the Hausa, who have historically been linked to Sudanese military formations (https://sudantribune.com/article261576/).
Calm appears to have finally returned after a week of intense violence, although there is a growing climate of tension within the Hausa communities characterized by the spread of a strongly hostile narrative toward the Berti, with a continued incitement to revenge.
The region’s governor, Ahmed El-Omda Badi, at a press conference condemned the violence and accused Omar al-Bashir’s past regime of instigating and supporting it with its own military units-especially the Rapid Support Forces, although he did not mention them-causing a bloody clash between the region’s original Berti communities and the Hausa communities of Nigerian origin (https://sudantribune.com/article261654/).
Also expressing deep concern about the violence in the Blue Nile region was UN Humanitarian Coordinator Khardiata Lo Ndiaye, who said that thousands of people have had to flee their homes leading to a real humanitarian emergency (https://sudantribune.com/article261692/).
