The Civil Authority of the New Sudan in Sudan’s Nuba Mountains Region has condemned the Killing of 11 schoolchildren and two teachers at Adra Primary School in Delami County on Thursday last week.

More than 46 children were left wounded during the incident when a Sudanese Air Force warplane dropped 3 bombs on the school premises and its neighborhood.

In a protest held in Kauda on Thursday, the civil authority strongly condemned the killing of innocent school children.

Deputy Governor Daud Isaiah Alful called on the demonstrators to stand together with the families of the deceased and asked God to have mercy on the innocent civilians who were killed by aerial bombs in Aladra. He also wished the injured a quick recovery. 

He said such incidents have been repeated several times in the Nuba Mountains.

“The government of Khartoum practices these actions to create fear among the civilian populations to stop them from entering the liberated areas of the Nuba Mountains region,” Isaiah stated. “We in the region understand that these messages are meant to stop children from going to schools, but we encourage parents to continue sending their children to school for education.”

The deputy governor advised teachers and headteachers to withstand the difficult moments that need hard decisions on how they can proceed with education.

He called on the International Community to stand against these actions of killing innocent civilians and school children.

Meanwhile, SPLM/SPLA-North Party Secretary General, Ashim Abdullah, said the aerial bombardment left all homes in the region in sorrow because of the death of innocent civilians. He added that the deceased children were the future of Sudan.

“It is not the first time this incident has happened, it happened in the year 2000 at St. Vincent Ferry Primary School in Kauda, Diocese of El-Obeid, also killing school children and teachers,” he explained. “And it happened again in 2015 and this is the third time it is happening in the region. The killing of innocent children and civilians is a crime against humanity and this is clear evidence.”

Another SPLM-N senior official, Amar Amun Daldum, said the latest bombing by the Sudan Air Force is a crime by the Government of Sudan against the marginalized people of the Nuba Mountains.

“The Sudanese government has been killing the children, old people, women, and other people of the Nuba Mountains Region which it has marginalized for the last 69 years,” he said.

A student of AL Masha Secondary School, Hamed Mamun Ismail, stated that they were demonstrating to tell the world that what the Government of Sudan did by attacking children in schools is criminal.

“We are here because of the killing of school children in Aladra. I condemn them and they should not bomb schools in Nuba Mountains,” he clarified.

The different secretariats in the Nuba Mountains Civil Administration including that of education, media, child welfare, local government, engineering, and agriculture among others, and youth and women associations took part in the demonstrations.