Statement by President Higgins on the second anniversary of the war in Sudan
Date: Tue 15th Apr, 2025 | 19:33
“Today marks the second anniversary of the commencement of the horrific war in Sudan.
We must all strongly support and be concerned on hearing the statement made by the United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres this week, where he has focused on the devastating impact of the conflict, and in particular on the increasing vulnerability of civilians.
In the Secretary-General’s words:
Two years into a devastating war, Sudan remains in a crisis of staggering proportions, with civilians paying the highest price. Indiscriminate shelling and air strikes continue to kill and maim. Markets, hospitals, schools, places of worship and displacement sites are being attacked. Sexual violence is rampant, with women and girls subjected to horrific acts. Civilians suffer from gross violations and abuses from all warring parties.”
This is a statement of the human condition which requires all of our response.
The Secretary-General went on in his statement to note that half of the population of Sudan, some 25 million people, are suffering from acute hunger.
The Secretary-General further stated:
As the lean season looms, famine has been identified in at least five locations and is projected to spread further. Aid workers have been targeted: at least 90 have lost their lives since the fighting began. Basic services have been decimated, with millions of children deprived of education, and less than one-quarter of health facilities are functional in the hardest hit areas. Attacks on infrastructure have left people without electricity and access to safe water.”
All possible efforts must be made to bring this violence to an end.
Unfortunately, such increased vulnerability is not confined to the crisis in Sudan, with egregious violations taking place in far too many parts of the world.
So many of us who have dedicated our lives to the advocacy of human rights are seeing evidence of human rights considerations evaporating before our eyes. There seems to be both the practice and the acceptance of impunity by the most powerful.
This is exemplified in recent days by Russia. The blatant disregard for civilian life and institutions seen in the attack on Sumy, including the outrageous repeat attack on those coming to the assistance of those affected by the first strike, is indicative of the low level to which the protection of civilian life has come.
In a similar fashion, we find the absence of any consideration on civilian rights in the attack on the Al-Ahli Hospital, available to those in Gaza whose life has been described by Secretary-General Guterres as ‘hell on earth’.
It is important to recognise that the current breaches of human rights in some of the most extreme forms are being carried out by non-State actors, such as in the Sudan war to which I have referred.
The acceptance of human rights protections of civilians, and particularly of the most vulnerable, has always been accepted as an obligation that no conditions of conflict could justify breaching.
Our present conditions suggest that we are experiencing, at so many levels, a nadir of humanity itself. A pattern is now emerging of some of the most outrageous invasions of human safety. Basic dignity and bodily integrity itself are becoming part of a daily reportage of the loss of the fundamental principle of international humanitarian law and international law in its most basic aspects.
We are experiencing appalling setbacks in human rights in so many places.
As somebody who first visited El Salvador in 1982 when, along with the late Sally O’Neill-Sanchez, I was among the first to write of the El Mozote massacre, and who had many years later returned when the massacre had been acknowledged, the Inter-American Human Rights Court had pronounced it an offence by the State, and having received awards from the Parliament, the President and the University, my heart can only sink when I see what is now prevailing in the prisons.
A further instance of falling standards is the idea of holding stations for migrants who are subjected to a violation with no recourse. This is just another example of the widespread actions that are taking place in conditions of impunity.
Against such a background, the recovery of the human rights movement must now be an urgent project. All those who see human rights as a basic universal standard must be concerned."