News in Brief
Blasts rock Khartoum
AFP – Air strikes pummelled Khartoum Saturday, with representatives of Sudan’s warring factions meeting in Saudi Arabia for talks to prevent a “humanitarian catastrophe” as the fighting entered a fifth week.
More than 750 people have been killed and hundreds of thousands displaced since fighting erupted on April 15 between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his deputy turned rival Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
UN: At least 500 believed to have died in Mali massacre
AP – Malian forces backed by foreign military personnel are believed to have killed at least 500 people over several days in a village last year, the U.N. said Friday, significantly raising the death toll from what already has been called the worst single atrocity in Mali’s decade-long fight against extremist groups.
The new report from the U.N. Human Rights Office details the violence that took place in the village of Moura in central Mali over the course of five days, and raises a previous toll of 300 dead given by Human Rights Watch.
U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk called the findings “extremely disturbing.”
“Summary executions, rape and torture during armed conflict amount to war crimes and could, depending on the circumstances, amount to crimes against humanity,” Turk said.