me to 40,000, but it has been ransacked so often by the government-backed Janjaweed militia that its dusty streets now lie empty.
After a bombing raid on September 11, many inhabitants moved to the African Union base on the outskirts, where 200 Rwandan peacekeepers are stationed. All around the barbed wire perimeter fence are makeshift homes built with dried grass and plastic tarpaulins.
More than 20,000 people live by the base and more arrive seeking refuge every day. Hassania Abubakar was in the nearby village of Tina when it was attacked. “We were farming as the children played in the water hole,” she said, surrounded by her four children. Suddenly Russian-built Antonov bombers used by the Sudanese government to attack villages appeared. “We grabbed our children and ran,” Abubakar said.
Two other children were wounded in the explosions that day. Their parents carried them six miles to the African Union base, from where they were taken to hospital. According to the peacekeepers, Sudanese troops then moved into the emptied village. Everything left behind was looted.
The Sudanese government has denied undertaking the continuing bombing raids and claims its military actions are in self-defence against rebels who will not sign last May’s peace deal.
The government of President Omar al-Bashir is refusing to admit 20,000 UN peacekeepers who were intended to replace the African Union’s contingent of 7,000 troops by the end of this week. Amid fears of a potential bloodbath, the African Union’s mandate has been extended until the end of the year.
“The best that can be said about the presence of the African Union is that they are witnesses,” said Roberta Cohen, an expert on Darfur at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “Their mandate is so weak that all they can do is monitor and report the violence.”
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