Haitham Dafallah
By Global News Service
On January 19, Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) abducted Haitham Dafallah, the chief editor of the Al-Maydan newspaper, published by the Sudanese Communist Party (SCP). The notorious paramilitary force also abducted Dafallah’s brother Omar.
At 11 p.m., the RSF returned to search and confiscate the cell phones in Dafallah’s home, where he stays with his three children, in the Al Giref West neighborhood in the east of the capital Khartoum. Located just over three kilometers from the headquarters of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), which the RSF is trying to capture, this residential neighborhood has been under the control of the RSF since the war began on April 15, 2023.
The besieged neighborhood experiences food shortages, as well as a lack of “running water and electricity,” a friend and comrade of Dafallah who chose not to be identified told Peoples Dispatch. “Most people have fled from there. The homes they left behind have been looted by the RSF.”
Calling for the “immediate release” of Dafallah and his brother, the Sudanese Journalists Union appealed to “all human rights organizations and those working for press freedom to… pressure the leaders of the [RSF] to prevent the arrest and intimidation of journalists.”
A number of leftist parties and organizations have also issued similar calls. In a statement, the Arab Maghreb Region Secretariat of the International Peoples’ Assembly demanded the release of Dafallah and called on “media outlets and journalists worldwide to condemn the targeting of civilians in Sudan, including journalists and activists.”
from the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service