Victims in the African country spoke about the shameful common practice
In the Sudanese city of Omdurman, women are forced to have sex with soldiers in exchange for food. Victims tell The Guardian about the widespread practice in war-torn Omdurman.
Women fighting to survive in the war-torn Sudanese city of Omdurman say they are being forced to have sex with soldiers in exchange for food, writes The Guardian.
More than two dozen women who were unable to escape the fighting in Omdurman said that sex with soldiers was their only way to gain access to food or goods. which they could sell to raise money to feed their families.
The women said that most of the attacks took place in the “factory district” city with the most food in the city.
One victim said she had no choice but to have sex with soldiers to get food for her elderly parents and 18-year-old daughter.< /p>
“Both of my parents are too old and sick, and I never let my daughter go out looking for food,” she said. “I went to the soldiers, and that was the only way to get food– they were everywhere in the factory area.
A woman said she was forced to have sex with soldiers at a meat processing plant in May last year — shortly after a devastating civil war broke out in Sudan between the regular army and paramilitary forces of the operational support, – and then again at the fava bean warehouse in January of this year.
Before the war began, the 37-year-old woman worked as a maid for families living in wealthy areas of Omdurman, but was too poor to be able to leave the city and move her family to a safer part of the country when the conflict began.
The conflict in Sudan has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced more than 10 million, according to the UN. A recent UN-backed report said nearly 26 million people, or just over half the population, were facing “severe food insecurity,” The Guardian reported.
Reports of rapes by armed men emerged within days of the conflict, which began on 15 April 2023. Numerous reports of RSF fighters systematically committing sexual violence were documented in the Khartoum area and in Darfur, the vast western region where RSF now controls all but one major population centre.
Some of the women who spoke to The Guardian said soldiers also demand sex in exchange for access to abandoned houses where items can still be looted to sell at local markets.
One woman said that after sex with the soldiers, she was allowed to take food, kitchen equipment and perfume from empty houses. She spoke of her shame over the sexual abuse she was forced to endure and how she had to steal property to survive.
“I’m not a thief,” she said. – What I experienced is indescribable, I wouldn’t wish it on my enemy… I did this only because I wanted to feed my children.”
Aid organizations are struggling to get food to desperately needy people across the country, and while the UN World Food Program recently said it had made deliveries to the Khartoum area, women The Guardian spoke to said they had not seen any or international aid arrived in their areas.
A third woman The Guardian spoke to said soldiers tortured her because she stopped having sex with them. The 21-year-old said she had sex with soldiers in exchange for permission to loot houses in western Omdurman, but stopped after her brothers told her they were against looting. The woman said that when she told the soldiers that she would not come to them again, two of them pinned her to the ground and burned her legs. “The soldiers told me that I was too confident for refusing to go with them,” the woman said, showing burn marks on her legs.
Soldiers and residents of Omdurman confirmed the reports. that women were forced to have sex. One soldier said that although he had never personally taken advantage of women, he had seen his colleagues do it. He described one case in which a woman had sex with soldiers, who in turn allowed her sisters to rob houses. “This is terrible,” said the soldier. “The number of sins in this city can never be forgiven.”
A resident of one of the districts of western Omdurman said that he saw soldiers bringing women to houses belonging to people who had fled. “A lot of women come and line up outside our area,” he said. “The soldiers allow them to enter and choose those they like to enter the houses. Sometimes I hear screams, but what can you do? Nothing.”
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