Australians have rejected a proposal to recognise Aboriginal people in the country’s constitution and establish a body to advise parliament on Indigenous issues.

Saturday’s voice to parliament referendum failed, with the defeat clear shortly after polls closed.

To succeed, the yes campaign – advocating for the voice – needed to secure a double majority, meaning it needed both a majority of the national vote, as well as majorities in four of Australia’s six states.

The defeat will be seen by Indigenous advocates as a blow to what has been a hard fought struggle to progress reconciliation and recognition in modern Australia, with First Nations people continuing to suffer discrimination, poorer health and economic outcomes.

The vote occurred 235 years on from British settlement, 61 years after Aboriginal Australians were granted the right to vote, and 15 years since a landmark prime ministerial apology for harm caused by decades of government policies including the forced removal of children from Indigenous families.

The concept for the advisory body, which would have included Indigenous representatives from each of Australia’s six states and two territories voted in by their local Indigenous electors, was developed and endorsed by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders in 2017. A majority of Indigenous voters supported the proposal, according to polling.

While such an advisory body could have been created through legislation, the proposal was designed to enshrine its existence in the constitution so it could not be removed by future governments.

The referendum question, to amend Australia’s constitution to recognise the first peoples of Australia by establishing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice to parliament, was deliberately vague. The failure of Australia’s previous referendum in 1999 – to become a republic and acknowledge Indigenous ownership – was seen to have failed because it put forward a specific model to voters.

Read more at the Guardian 

The International Commission of Human Rights Experts on Ethiopia (ICHREE) released its final report today detailing human rights violations committed during the two-year war in Tigray, Amhara, Afar and ongoing conflict in the Oromia region before its mandate was terminated.

The draft motion to extend the ICHREE was not renewed and passed its deadline on October 4th, despite repeated appeals from leading human rights organisations worldwide calling for its extension.

In the weeks prior to this deadline, members of the Commission sounded alarms over the high risk of continued atrocities absent independent investigations into ongoing human rights abuses in the country. They expressed deep concerns about the potential for further crimes against civilians given the volatile climate in Ethiopia.

Thousands died in a two-year conflict between the government and regional forces from Tigray, which formally came to an end in November last year. Both sides accused each other of atrocities, including massacres, rape and arbitrary detentions, but each denied responsibility for systemic abuses.

In the report released at the end of the Human Rights Council’s 54th session, the commission implicated Ethiopian federal forces, Eritrean forces, and allied regional forces in “mass killings, widespread and systematic rape and sexual violence, including sexualised slavery against women and girls, deliberate starvation, forced displacement, and large-scale arbitrary detentions which amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity”.

It accused Tigrayan forces of “killings, widespread rape and sexual violence, destruction of property and looting amounting to war crimes”.

Ethiopia, which denies committing widespread abuses, has strongly opposed the investigation and tried to cut its work short. It has instead promoted its own national justice policies as the preferred avenue of inquiry - an approach the U.N. commission described as "deeply flawed".

“The scale and continuity of violence in Ethiopia since 03 November 2020 is such that the present report cannot be considered to be fully reflective of the harms experienced by civilians in the regions under investigation,” said Mohamed Chande Othman, the chairperson of the Commission.

The commission said it did not have sufficient time or resources to make a determination on potential genocide or crimes of extermination. But Othman stressed the vital need for fuller investigations to establish facts and legal accountability.

Commission expert Radhika Coomaraswamy said hopes for domestic accountability are “extremely remote,” leaving victims desperate for regional and international action. Fellow expert Steven Ratner called it a major blow for victims that the commission’s work was halted prematurely, stressing that “it is essential that this work continues.”, 

With its mandate terminated after today’s presentation, the commission issued a stern warning that the road to justice must not end here. It expressed grave concern over the continued presence of Eritrean forces in Tigray, saying their violations both before and after recent ceasefire deals underscore how impunity breeds further atrocities.

Commenting on the lapsing of the investigation, Lucy McKernan, who follows U.N. human rights mechanisms for Human Rights Watch, said: "Having no resolution is scandalous in the face of the report of the experts that was just published."

Physicians for Human Rights, a New York-based advocacy group that uses science and medicine to document and campaign against mass atrocities, deplored the failure to renew the mandate.

"Without the comprehensive and sustained independent investigation that ICHREE has been providing there can be little hope that survivors, their families and communities can be healed and receive justice," said Saman Zia-Zarifi, the group's executive director.

On Tuesday, the EU pledged a $680 million aid package that it had delayed in 2021 due to the war and said the two sides were working to "gradually normalise relations".

A European diplomat said the EU expected Ethiopia to implement a robust and transparent "transitional justice policy, deal with prosecution and enhance accountability, in line with regional and international human rights standards."

"We expect quick and tangible progress in the coming months, also in view of the next session of the Human Rights Council," the diplomat said, referring to the session beginning in February next year.

Read more here

Read the report here

Dozens of people have been killed by an artillery strike on a refugee camp in the Kachin state.

30 people, including women and children, were killed in Myanmar in an artillery strike on a camp for displaced people in Kachin State near the border with China

The attack took place at Mung Lai Hkyet IDP camp, a few kilometres from a military base run by the Kachin Independence Army (KIA), the military wing of the KIO and one of many groups fighting against Myanmar’s military junta, which seized power in 2021.

Col. Naw Bu, a spokesperson for the KIA, told The Associated Press that 29 people, including 11 children under the age of 16, were killed and 57 others injured in the air attacks. The National Unity Government, which is coordinating the resistance to the military government, claims that “based on initial reports, at least 30 have been killed, including women and 13 children and at least a further 57 have been injured.”

The camp is in an area controlled by the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO), one of several ethnic groups which have been fighting for self-rule for many decades.

The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) - the KIO's armed wing - is one of the largest and most powerful groups in Myanmar. It has been fighting the central government sporadically since 1960 and consistently since a ceasefire broke down in 2011.

Since the coup, the military government has viewed the KIA as a significant threat, as it has been giving weapons and training to some of the new insurgent groups which have formed across the country to resist military rule.

KIA also has a long-standing alliance with the Arakan Army, an insurgent group formed initially in Kachin State. But since 2016, it has been operating in Rakhine State, on the other side of the country, where it has successfully challenged the military for control of much of the territory.

Gen Zaw Min Tun, a junta spokesperson, denied the military was responsible. He told military-controlled TV that the junta had analysed the incident and believed that the explosion was caused by bombs that had been kept in storage by the KIA.

The military has frequently been accused of striking civilian sites, including hospitals, schools, religious sites and civilian homes. Last year, the military killed 60 people, including musicians and children, in an airstrike that targeted a concert in Kachin.

The attack took place on the same day that Myanmar’s ambassador to the United Nations, Kyaw Moe Tun, told a UN committee that, since the coup, the military has imported more than $ 1bn worth of arms and raw materials for a “scorched-earth policy that has murdered more than 4,000 civilians including women and children, forcibly displaced around 2 million and destroyed or burned down over 75,000 homes”.

Read more at Reuters 

Israel's use of white phosphorous "violates international humanitarian law", Human Rights Watch reports following attacks on Gaza and Lebanon. 

Israel’s use of white phosphorus in military operations in Gaza and Lebanon puts civilians at risk of serious and long-term injuries, Human Rights Watch said today in releasing a question and answer document on white phosphorus. Human Rights Watch verified videos taken in Lebanon and Gaza on October 10 and 11, 2023, respectively, showing multiple airbursts of artillery-fired white phosphorus over the Gaza City port and two rural locations along the Israel-Lebanon border, and interviewed two people who described an attack in Gaza.

The use of white phosphorus in Gaza, one of the most densely populated areas in the world, magnifies the risk to civilians and violates the international humanitarian law prohibition on putting civilians at unnecessary risk.

On October 11, Human Rights Watch interviewed by phone two people from the al-Mina area in Gaza City, who described observing strikes consistent with the use of white phosphorus. One was in the street at the time, while the other was in a nearby office building. Both described ongoing airstrikes before seeing explosions in the sky followed by what they described as white lines going earthward. They estimated that the attack took place sometime between 11:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. Both said that the smell was stifling. The person who was in his office said that the smell was so strong that he went toward the window to see what was happening and then filmed the strike.

Human Rights Watch reviewed the video and verified that it was taken in Gaza City’s port and identified that the munitions used in the strike were airburst 155mm white phosphorus artillery projectiles. Other videos posted to social media and verified by Human Rights Watch show the same location. Dense white smoke and a garlic smell are characteristics of white phosphorus.

White phosphorus ignites when exposed to atmospheric oxygen and continues to burn until it is deprived of oxygen or exhausted. Its chemical reaction can create intense heat (about 815°C/1,500°F), light, and smoke.

Upon contact, white phosphorus can burn people, thermally and chemically, down to the bone as it is highly soluble in fat and therefore in human flesh. White phosphorus fragments can exacerbate wounds even after treatment and can enter the bloodstream and cause multiple organ failure. Already dressed wounds can reignite when dressings are removed and the wounds are re-exposed to oxygen. Even relatively minor burns are often fatal

The UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) has called the situation in the Gaza Strip “dire” and warned that crucial supplies were running dangerously low after Israel imposed a total blockade on the territory.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said fuel for hospital generators in Gaza would run out shortly, adding that its stocks of aid and medicine within Gaza were stranded for want of safe passage.

Israel’s energy minister, Israel Katz, said earlier today that no power, water or fuel would be allowed to enter Gaza until Israeli hostages are returned home.

The number of Palestinians killed has risen to 1,537, according to Gaza’s health ministry. That includes 500 children and 276 women.

A further 6,612 were wounded in Israeli airstrikes.

Read more at Human Rights Watch

^{photograph by Mohammed Abed of an Israeli strike on a building in Gaza, 9 October 2023}

Israel has declared a "complete siege" on Gaza as the United Nations states there is "clear evidence" of war crimes committed in the conflict. 

900 Palestinians have been killed, which includes 260 children following intense bombing by Israel across Gaza. The area is home to about 2.3 million people in total - 80% of whom rely on humanitarian aid.

Since the attacks began on Saturday morning, Israel has stopped all supplies entering Gaza, including food and medicine.

Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for the UN secretary-general, said more than a dozen healthcare workers had been killed or injured and at least seven medical centres had been damaged.

Meanwhile, many people are currently without electricity and internet, and could soon be out of essential food and water supplies.

"Damage to water, sanitation and hygiene facilities has undermined services to more than 400,000 people," said Mr Dujarric, speaking to BBC News

"The Gaza Power Plant is now the only source of electricity and could run out of fuel within days."

He added that the World Food Programme was already distributing food for up to 100,000 internally displaced Palestinians and that these efforts would increase eight-fold in the coming days. More than 200,000 civilians have been displaced following the bombing campaign. As Nethanyahu called on people to leave Gaza, Israeli air strikes targeted the only land crossing into Egypt forcing its closure. 

A massive Israeli military buildup has continued along Gaza’s border on Tuesday, as the country’s military confirmed the death toll from Saturday’s Hamas attack – the deadliest militant assault in its history – had passed 1,000.

About 150 people are believed to be being held captive by militants in Gaza, Evidence of the scale of Saturday’s attack has continued to emerge, including in the southern kibbutz of Be’eri, where more than 100 bodies have been retrieved, about 10% of the community’s population. thousands witnessed a massacre at an Israeli music festival where Hamas fighters killed at least 260 people and took captives back into Gaza.

The country’s military said on Tuesday that it had recovered the bodies of more than 1,500 Hamas fighters inside Israel, giving the clearest indication yet of the scale of the weekend’s assault.

The huge scale of the mobilisation suggests Israel is preparing for a far more substantial military attack against Hamas in Gaza than in the previous rounds of fighting, which claimed thousands of Palestinian lives.

Read more at the Guardian

Pakistan has ordered for the deportation of an estimated 1.7 million Afghan refugees by the end of November, in a move the Taliban has opposed as “unacceptable”.

The recent crackdown follows a deadly blast at a mosque in Mastung city near the Afghanistan border, resulting in over 50 casualties during a religious celebration. Balochistan province, near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, has been a frequent target of armed groups, including the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Islamic State.

Pakistan’s caretaker Interior Minister Sarfraz Bugti alleged that Afghan nationals had carried out 14 out of 24 suicide bombings in Pakistan this year. The Taliban has rejected rumours that Afghan militants were involved in the attack.

Responding to the attack, Pakistan has established a taskforce to identify and seize private businesses and assets owned by "illegal" Afghans. Reports indicate that local authorities have already begun detaining Afghans, both those with and without legal status. Afghanistan's embassy disclosed that over 1,000 Afghans have been detained in the past two weeks.

Starting November 1, Pakistan will only allow visitors with visas and passports to enter, a departure from the historical use of national identity cards by Afghan travellers. Obtaining visas and passports has become a lengthy process, contributing to the backlog of Afghans seeking entry into Pakistan.

India has told Canada to remove 41 of its 62 staff in the country, in an escalation of diplomatic tensions between the two countries. 

According to officials who spoke to the Financial Times, the Indian foreign ministry has given Canada a week to repatriate two-thirds of its diplomats stationed in India, reducing the number to 21. An official familiar with the matter confirmed the report to the Associated Press. Those who stayed past 10 October would lose their diplomatic immunity, the Financial Times first reported.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs declined to comment, but ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi had previously called for a reduction in Canadian diplomats in India, saying they outnumbered India’s staffing in Canada.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said last month that there were “credible allegations” of Indian involvement in the slaying of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a 45-year-old Sikh leader who was killed by masked gunmen in June in Surrey, outside Vancouver.

On Tuesday, Trudeau didn’t confirm the number of diplomats who have been told to leave but suggested Canada would not retaliate.

“Obviously, we are going through an extremely challenging time with India right now, but that’s why it is so important for us to have diplomats on the ground working with the Indian government and there to support Canadians and Canadian families,” Trudeau said. “We’re taking this extremely seriously, but we’re going to continue to engage responsibly and constructively with the Indian government.”

Canadian Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly said she’s in contact with the Indian government.

“We will continue to engage privately because we think that diplomatic conversations are best when they remain private,” Joly said.

The allegation of India’s involvement in the killing is based in part on the surveillance of Indian diplomats in Canada, including intelligence provided by a major ally, a separate Canadian official previously told The Associated Press.

The official said that the communications involved Indian officials and diplomats in Canada and that some of the intelligence was provided by a member of the “Five Eyes” intelligence-sharing alliance, which includes the United States, Britain, Australia and New Zealand, in addition to Canada. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

The latest expulsions by India have escalated tensions between the countries. Trudeau had frosty encounters with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during last month’s Group of 20 meeting in New Delhi, and a few days later, Canada cancelled a trade mission to India planned for the fall.

Read more here

A former Bolivian president and his defence minister have agreed to pay damages to the families of people killed by the military during their government, in a landmark settlement that sets a precedent by which other foreign leaders could face accountability for human rights abuse in US courts.

The settlement concerns events in 2003, when massive protests broke out over then president Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada’s plan to export Bolivia’s natural gas. The army was sent to clear blockades in the largely Indigenous and working-class city of El Alto, killing more than 60 protesters and injuring hundreds.

Both Sánchez de Lozada and his defence minister, José Carlos Sánchez Berzain, resigned and fled to the US, where they have lived ever since.

In 2007, a civil lawsuit was brought against them in the US by eight Bolivian families whose relations were killed in 2003.

Eleven years later, a federal jury found them responsible for the killings and awarded the plaintiffs $10m in compensatory damages.

Both defendants appealed, but as a result of the agreement on Thursday, they have withdrawn their appeal and agreed to pay an undisclosed sum in compensatory damages to the families.

“With this agreement, the jury verdict remains intact,” said Thomas Becker, the human rights lawyer who led the legal action. “And that’s the most important part: to send this message that no leader can kill their people and then use the US as a refuge.”

Asli Bâli, a law professor at Yale Law School who was not involved in the case, agreed that it set an important precedent.

“When someone this high-profile is held accountable, it sends a message,” said Bâli. “First, to human rights violators, that the US will not be a safe haven, and no one is above the law. But also to victims and survivors, in Bolivia and around the world, that there are more avenues for accountability than they might realise.”

The case was brought under the Torture Victim Protection Act, a law that expanded US jurisdiction to cases of torture or extrajudicial killings committed outside its territory.

Read more at Guardian 

Thousands of ethnic Armenians fled Nagorno-Karabakh on Monday in lines of cars which stretched for kilometres after Azerbaijan took control of the breakaway region sparking fears of persecution.

The Azerbaijani military routed Armenian forces in a 24-hour blitz last week, forcing the authorities of the breakaway region to agree to lay down weapons. They also agreed to start talks on the “reintegration” of Nagorno-Karabakh, also known as Artsakh, into Azerbaijan, after three decades of separatist rule.

r\Atak Beglaryan, a former adviser to the self-declared government of Artsakh, told The Independent that people fear reprisals and ethnic cleansing and so “almost all the villages” and large parts of main city Stepanakert, which Azerbaijan calls Khankendi, “are emptying”.

“They are fleeing because of the genocidal policy of Azerbaijan, the blockade, their aggression, and the failure of Russian peacekeepers to guarantee protection,” Mr Beglaryan added with desperation.

“It is impossible to live under Azerbaijani subjugation. The Azerbaijani state and society is full of hatred of Armenians.

“The international community is just looking at this and saying sorry. Nothing else is being done. We are frustrated with everyone. We are frustrated with humanity.”

Both sides have been locked in a bloody battle over the mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh region since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. It is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan – which is backed by Turkey – but home to 120,000 ethnic Armenians who have enjoyed de facto independence since then.

In 2020, a six-week war erupted during which nearly 7,000 people were killed Azerbaijan reclaimed swathes of region. Russia, historically a close ally of Armenia, brokered a truce and dispatched 2,000 peacekeepers. But in recent months Moscow has taken a step back since building stronger ties with Azerbaijan and Turkey after suffering crippling sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine.

And so on Tuesday, the Russian-agreed true was broken by the Azerbaijan army who launched a 24-hour string of lightning strikes against the severely outnumbered and outgunned breakaway forces. The area had been struggling with a humanitarian crisis due to Azerbaijan’s blockade of the “Lachin Corridor” - the road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia - piling on further pressure.

Read more here 

The United States has recognised the Cook Islands and Niue as “sovereign and independent” states and pledged to open diplomatic relations.

In a statement on Monday, Biden said “the history and the future of the Pacific Islands and the United States are inextricably linked”.

“The United States’ recognition of the Cook Islands, and the establishment of diplomatic relations will not only strengthen the ties between our nations, it will help ensure that our shared future is more secure, more prosperous, and more free — for our people and people around the world.”

The US president is hosting the leaders of Pacific Island nations for two days of discussions in Washington, DC, this week.

The US-Pacific Island Forum Summit is expected to focus heavily on the effects of the climate crisis, as well as economic growth, sustainable development and public health.

The forum includes Australia, the Cook Islands, Micronesia, Fiji, French Polynesia, Kiribati, Nauru, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu.

Justin Trudeau has said there is “credible evidence” India is responsible for the alleged assassination of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a prominent Canadian Sikh leader.

The Canadian prime minister told the House of Commons of Canada on Monday that, in recent weeks, national security authorities had been probing allegations that New Delhi was behind a state-sponsored assassination.

"Any involvement of a foreign government in the killing of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil is an unacceptable violation of our sovereignty,” he said. “Canada is a rule-of-law country, the protection of our citizens and defence of our sovereignty are fundamental.

“Our top priorities have therefore been one, that our law enforcement and security agencies ensure the continued safety of all Canadians. And two, that all steps be taken to hold perpetrators of this murder to account.”

The foreign affairs minister, Mélanie Joly, said Canada had expelled a “key Indian diplomat” and “expects India to fully collaborate with us and ultimately to get to the bottom of this”.

India’s ministry of external affairs said in a statement it “rejected” statements by Trudeau and his foreign minister, adding that allegations of India’s involvement in any act of violence in Canada are “absurd and motivated”.

The New Democratic party leader, Jagmeet Singh, who is Sikh, said there must be consequences for the assassination. “To hear the prime minister of Canada corroborate a potential link between a murder of a Canadian citizen on Canadian soil by a foreign government is something I could never have imagined,” he said.

“We will ensure that no rock is unturned, that every possible link is examined.”

The Conservative leader, Pierre Poilievre, said the allegations, if true, “represent an outrageous affront to Canada”, adding that citizens should be free from extrajudicial killings.

He added: “Canadians deserve to be protected on Canadian soil. We call on the Indian government to act with utmost transparency as authorities investigate this murder, because the truth must come out.”

In June, Nijjar was shot and killed in front of the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, British Columbia. He was a strong advocate of the Khalistan movement, which seeks an independent homeland for Sikhs in India’s Punjab region.

Read more here

Testimonies from over 200 people accusing the Ugandan president, his son, and other senior officials of killings, torture, and other crimes against humanity have been submitted to the International Criminal Court (ICC). 

In total, there are 26 officials that have been accused of aiding the incarceration and systemic abuse of Ugandans who supported opposition leader Bobi Wine in 2021.

Among those accused is President Yoweri Museveni who has been in power for nearly four decades, and his son Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba. 

Faruk Kirunda, the president's deputy press secretary, labeled the accusers as political opponents with the goal of "tarnishing the image of President Museveni".

Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor for the ICC, has previously stated that his office is overwhelmed with investigations of alleged war crimes in Afghanistan and Ukraine.

It may be months or years before the ICC announces whether it will investigate a case. 

Read the full NYT article here 

<p>Eighty Afghans may have been victims of summary killings by three separate British SAS units operating in the country between 2010 and 2013, lawyers representing the bereaved families have told a public inquiry.</p> <p>One of the elite soldiers is believed to have “personally killed” 35 Afghans on a single six-month tour of duty as part of an alleged policy to terminate “all fighting-age males” in homes raided, “regardless of the threat they posed”.</p> <p>Between June 2011 and May 2013, 25 suspicious deaths were recorded by the lawyers, which included an allegation that in one SAS raid that “resulted in the deaths of 4/5 Afghans” only one grenade was found. The events of the operation were so violent that two Afghan children “had to be urgently evacuated for medical treatment”.</p> <p>It had been previously estimated that there were 54 Afghan victims from a single SAS unit, but the lawyers now argue the allegations cover more British troops and a longer period than previously suggested, and “reveal credible evidence of a widespread and systematic pattern of unlawful extrajudicial killings”.</p> <p>The lawyers also argue that in the years that followed, there was “a wide-ranging, multilayered and years-long cover-up” involving senior officers, officials and a range of inquiries. At one point, military police ordered the leadership of the UK’s special forces not to delete any material held on their server.</p> <p>Read more at the <u><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jul/02/eighty-afghan-civilians…">Guardian&nbsp;</a></u></p>

British MPs have been warned of the possibility of genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan and urged to put pressure on the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group, which has been accused of murder and arson attacks on minority groups in the area.

The Janjaweed were accused of carrying out a genocide against Darfuri ethnic groups on behalf of the Sudanese government, killing an estimated 300,000 people since 2003. While the scale of violence eased over the years, attacks on Darfuri ethnic groups by Arab militias linked to the RSF continued, especially after the withdrawal of peacekeeping troops in 2020, displacing half a million people in the first six months of 2022.

 The RSF has been fighting the Sudanese army for control of the country in the capital, Khartoum, it has been accused of waging a separate war in Darfur where the Janjaweed militias, from which the RSF was formed, were accused of genocide almost 20 years ago.

“The war in Khartoum is totally different from in Darfur,” Saif Nemir, a UN employee who escaped the Janjaweed, told the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on Sudan and South Sudan on Monday. “The war in Darfur is the Janjaweed attacking innocent people sitting in their own villages.”

The RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, has since accumulated military and financial power from goldmines he controls in Darfur, which mostly supply the United Arab Emirates.

Vicky Ford, the chair of the APPG, said the UAE and Saudi Arabia should be pressured into severing ties with the RSF because of its violence in Darfur, and with the Sudanese army for the wider conflict in Sudan.

“Why has the UK not sanctioned the commercial wings of the RSF and the SAF, as the US has?” she asked. “What pressure is being put on the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, given that many RSF and SAF commercial entities are registered there?”

She told parliament last week that “a systemic ethnic cleansing” was occurring in Darfur.

The UN said at the weekend it had received testimony of summary executions and persistent violence over the course of last week, accompanied by hate speech calling for the Masalit to be killed and expelled from Sudan.

El Geneina, the Capital of West Darfur has been the site of heavy fighting between the RSF and the Sudanese armed forces (SAF).

Dr Ahmed Abbas, the vice-president of the Sudan Doctors Union, told the meeting that up to 5,000 people had been killed and 8,000 injured around El Geneina over the past two months, with bodies left in the street, posing a potential public health risk.

He said only the city’s military hospital was still in operation, which civilians could not access. Two doctors had been killed by RSF fighters while at work, he added.

“The attack on El Geneina has reduced it to a wasteland – around 75% of residents have crossed to Chad and those remaining were unable to leave,” he said. “What is happening in Sudan is manifesting as a genocide in Darfur.”

Read more at the Guardian