The United Nations announced yesterday that its peacekeepers confirmed that 14 civilians were killed and 18 wounded in a recent bombing in Sudan’s western Darfur region.
UNAMID, the joint African Union – UN peacekeeping mission in Darfur, has not often confirmed reports of bombings in Darfur, owing to lack of access and its own public information policies.
Sudanese warplanes have been pounding central Darfur’s mountainous Jebel Marra region for years. Most of the civilians trapped in the area have no access to humanitarian supplies of food or medicines.
Speaking at the UN headquarters in New York yesterday, however, the spokesman of the UN Secretary-General Stephane Dujarric said that UNAMID troops visited a bombing site in Rowata.
“From Darfur, the Joint AU-UN Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) is able to confirm the dropping of 10 bombs which led to the killing of 14 civilians and the wounding of 18 others in Rowata, Central Darfur, on April 1st,” he said.
“Yesterday, a verification patrol was dispatched to Rowata; while it was in the village, the team witnessed another aerial bombardment, consisting of five bombs dropped close to where they were standing. The UN Mission strongly condemns such aerial bombings, which cause widespread death, destruction and displacement of populations.”
The independent Radio Dabanga reported several bombings around the same time in Darfur. Citing a military source, the station said five people were reportedly killed in an air raid on western Jebel Marra in Rofita area in Rokoro Locality.
In another attack reported on 2 April, a child died and large tracts of farmland were burnt down when the Sudanese Air Force bombed an area near Fanga, in East Jebel Marra.