VZCZCXRO1282
OO RUEHGI RUEHMA RUEHROV RUEHTRO
DE RUEHKH #0760/01 1681331
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 171331Z JUN 09
FM AMEMBASSY KHARTOUM
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 3952
INFO RUCNFUR/DARFUR COLLECTIVE
RUEHGG/UN SECURITY COUNCIL COLLECTIVE
RHMFISS/CJTF HOA

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KHARTOUM 000760 
 
DEPT FOR SE GRATION, S/USSES, AF A/S CARSON, AF/C 
NSC FOR MGAVIN 
DEPT PLS PASS USAID FOR AFR/SUDAN 
ADDIS ABABA ALSO FOR USAU 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ASEC PGOV PREL KPKO SOCI AU UNSC SU
SUBJECT: DARFURI FEMALE STUDENTS AT UNIVERSITY OF KHARTOUM BEATEN 
AND SUBSEQUENTLY ARRESTED 
 
REF: 2008 KHARTOUM 847 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: Men dressed in black abayas (Note: an Islamic 
dress, common in Saudi Arabia but less so here, that covers a 
woman's entire body. End Note) reportedly raided a women's dormitory 
at the University of Khartoum in the early morning of June 11 and 
assaulted 15 Darfuri women.  The following morning, the most 
severely-injured students sought treatment at a Khartoum hospital, 
but Sudanese police forced them to leave several hours later. 
Officers from Sudan's National Intelligence and Security Service 
(NISS) detained some of the women and reportedly beat them during 
interrogation.  The women are now staying at a safe house in 
Omdurman, but have no access to medical treatment.  Although 
incidents of this type are far less common now than during the 
height of the Darfur war in 2003, this incident demonstrates that 
the regime continues to target individuals whom it views as 
opponents.  End summary. 
 
¶2. (SBU) On Wednesday, June 10, a fight between a Darfuri female 
student and a National Congress Party (NCP)-allied  female student 
at the University of Khartoum erupted into a large brawl, pitting 
women from different political alignments against each other. 
According to Osman Mohamed Negeimi, head of the Darfur Students' 
Union (DSU) at the University of Khartoum, university authorities 
managed to quell the fighting, and the students returned to their 
dormitories.  However, at 1 a.m. on Thursday, June 11, men wearing 
long, all-black abayas entered the rooms of the all-women's 
dormitory and beat 15 female students,  injuring five severely. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Speaking with poloff on June 15 at a safe house in 
Omdurman, victims and witnesses of the assault said that eight men 
in black abayas gained access to their dormitory and awoke them by 
yelling offensive statements and threatening to rape them.  The men 
used their fists and feet to attack them, and they also hit them 
with metal cables wrapped in plastic, an item commonly used in Sudan 
to lock gates.  According to the women, the violent assault lasted 
more than 15 minutes, and 15 women were injured, five critically 
enough to require immediate hospitalization.  Several of the women 
reportedly wrestled one man to the ground during the attack, removed 
his abaya and his shirt to confirm he was disguised as a woman.  One 
woman told poloff that her attacker threatened to rape her, and when 
she resisted, he began beating her.  None of the women reported 
being raped, but all said that they feared sexual assault during the 
attack.  The women said that the men also stole items from their 
rooms, including laptop computers, money, and jewelry. 
 
¶4. (SBU) After the attackers departed, officers from the NISS along 
with Sudanese police and university authorities, forced the women to 
free the male assailant whom they still held. He was then released 
without charges brought against him.    Authorities permitted five 
women who were severely injured to go to a hospital for medical 
care, and polasst visited Khartoum Hospital on June 11 to meet with 
the women in the intensive care unit.  That day, a group of the 
women from the same dormitory, including those who had been 
assaulted, but had not sought medical treatment, attempted to visit 
the hospital but were detained by NISS.  During their detention, the 
women were fingerprinted and interrogated, and forced to kneel with 
their heads facing the wall.  Some women reported that their 
interrogators beat them with plastic PVC pipes on their backs and 
arms where they had received injuries during the assaults.  Other 
women who had been more severely injured reported that NISS 
interrogators only threatened to beat them.  All of the women 
witnessed the interrogations and confirmed each other's accounts of 
the beatings. 
 
¶5. (SBU) On Thursday afternoon, June 11, Sudanese police forced the 
women in the intensive care unit from the hospital, and doctors 
there told them they could not return for treatment.  The women took 
refuge in a safe house in Omdurman belonging to Sudanese Liberation 
Movement/Minni Minnawi (SLM/MM), where they have remained since the 
incident.  The women have not received any additional medical 
treatment, and speaking with poloff and polasst on June 15 at the 
house, they said it was unlikely they would return to their 
university dormitory.  During the visit by poloff, the fifteen 
victims displayed large black welts on their faces, legs, arms and 
backs.  Several of the women complained of untreated injuries: one 
said she had a broken rib and a separated shoulder as a result of 
being thrown to the floor; one said her arm was broken in two 
places; another  said she had been choked, and had a scar on her 
forearm from where a man bit her.  The women also showed poloff 
digital photos of the most severely injured woman, who declined to 
meet with poloff; they reported that she had lost four teeth in the 
attack, and that her face was still swollen and bruised. 
 
 
KHARTOUM 00000760  002 OF 002 
 
 
¶6. (SBU) The women, who did not want to disclose their names, showed 
poloff the weapons their attackers left behind, including five of 
the flexible steel locks and long knives.  Additionally, during 
their detention, the women's identity documents were cut, leaving 
them with no proper form of identification.  The women said their 
attackers were not students, because they would have recognized if 
the man they wrestled to the floor had been a University of Khartoum 
student.  Instead, they told poloff that they believed the men were 
members of NISS's security team that operates at the University of 
Khartoum.  Negeimi agreed with their suspicions, saying that 
witnesses and victims reported that the men arrived in vehicles on 
the night of the attack (instead of on foot,) and that they knew the 
layout of both the campus and the interior of the women's 
dormitory. 
 
¶7. (SBU) Speaking with poloff on June 16, Negeimi, head of the DSU, 
said that the attacks illustrate the NCP's  culture of hostility 
toward Darfuris at Khartoum's universities.  Negeimi said the 
attacks are similar in both mode and intent to the NISS assault of 
20 Darfuri students in June 2008 (reftel).  He reported that sexual 
harassment of students has increased since then, and observed that 
the universities in Khartoum are becoming less welcoming places for 
female students.  He said the DSU does not intend to open a legal 
case following this attack, as it has  already opened 20 unresolved 
cases with Khartoum police following thefts, physical assaults and 
incidents of sexual harassment against Darfuri students.  Meanwhile, 
Negeimi reports that tensions among students continue to increase at 
the University of Khartoum.  He reported that on June 11 two Darfuri 
students were injured when an NCP supporter threw a Molotov cocktail 
into a crowd of Darfuri students, and that on June 15 NISS detained 
two Darfuri students - Hassan Mohamed Ahmed and Muktar Adam - from 
the school's campus. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Comment: The June 11 assault of 15 Darfuri female students, 
 and their subsequent detention, show that although the atmosphere 
in Khartoum has improved since the height of the Darfur war in 2003, 
the NCP regime continues to intimidate and harass the Darfuri 
community here.  The University of Khartoum will soon adjourn for 
summer vacation, but when students return in the fall, such problems 
will most likely continue.  End comment. 
 
ASQUINO