How Canada can help end the war in Sudan

Sudan is now at a breaking point.

The conflict between the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) has already killed hundreds of civilians, injured more than 5,000 and forced nearly one million to flee. The numbers are a vast undercount and fail to capture the impending disaster in a country hosting more than 1.3 million refugees and over more than four million internally displaced people in precarious conditions. The health-care system is on the verge of collapse: seventy per cent of hospitals near battlegrounds are inoperable. The UNHCR expects an outflow of 860,000 people. The UN World Food Program predicts the conflict will send 19 million people, or 40 per cent of the population, into acute food insecurity; one-third of the population was dependent on aid before the war. International humanitarian groups have suspended operations or evacuated staff.

But Canada is far from powerless to help. We know the parties responsible for this humanitarian catastrophe. Two generals, Mohamed Hamdan, or Hemedti, and Abdul-Fattah al-Burhan are threatening an entire country over an internal power struggle and control of major industries. They are supported by a network of entities that can all be traced and directly targeted with sanctions.

Despite this long history of atrocities, Canada has yet to sanction a single individual or entity in Sudan. The generals orchestrated mass atrocities in Darfur, which killed over 300,000 and led to the only genocide charge issued by the International Criminal Court; massacred protesters in June 2019; and violently retook power in a 2021 coup.

According to a top U.S. intelligence official, the fighting will likely be protracted because both sides “have few incentives to come to the negotiating table.” But Canada can increase those incentives by targeting the perpetrators and enablers with sanctions. On May 3, nearly three weeks into the conflict, Canada announced $30 million in humanitarian aid to its partners in Sudan. Contrast this with its pledge to match Canadian donations and an additional $100 million within the first week of the war in Ukraine, a country with a smaller population. Canada has sanctioned nearly 2,000 Russian individuals or entities. The inconsistent application of Canadian foreign policy contradicts core Canadian values of equity and global peace.

Canada also has a history of overlooking private complicity in the violence in Sudan, given the relatively recent scandal of Canadian-owned firms offering lobbying services and even breaching the UN arms embargo by sending military vehicles to Sudan.

The government can reverse this trend by supporting the peaceful democratic movement in Sudan and enforcing mechanisms to disrupt supply chains fuelling the warring factions.

Canada should take a firm stance to support the democratic movement in Sudan, instead of the military factions. Canada's feminist foreign policy demands a heightened commitment to the women who were the faces of the democratic revolution in 2019, their protection, and their participation in peace-building efforts. Canada should also directly support grassroots initiatives, community leaders and resistance committees. These actors are best placed to mediate and respond to local needs after cultivating the conditions for a democratic transition. The Sudanese people deserve to hear voices of peace and democracy rather than the blasts of military jets, shelling, and anti-aircraft guns.

Targeted sanctions can respond to the long calls for accountability by isolating the key perpetrators, cutting them off from financial flows funding the war, and turning them into global pariahs.

Canada is the first country to have passed a law allowing the confiscation of sanctioned assets for the restoration of peace and stability, victim compensation, and reconstruction. This law was passed precisely in order to respond to clearcut situations such as in Sudan, where Canada can impose real, immediate costs on the principal perpetrators while diverting those resources toward sustainable solutions. This is a chance for Canada to lead and regain its status as an effective international player that stands for humanitarian principles.

Mutasim Ali is a Legal Adviser at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, specializing in targeted human rights sanctions and a Doctor of Juridical Science Candidate at American University Washington College of Law. Yonah Diamond is an international human rights lawyer specializing in atrocity prevention at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre.