According to the UN, about 60 other people were injured.
Over 60 people were killed and another 60 injured in an armed attack in Western Darfur province, Sudan. A statement issued by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on Sunday said.
“More than 60 people were reportedly killed and about 60 injured in an armed attack July 25 in the village of Mistri, north of Beida in Western Darfur,” the statement said. According to OCHA, the attack, which involved some 500 armed men, burned homes of local residents in different parts of the village, as well as a market.
In Western Darfur, a lockdown (severe bans) regime was imposed in response to a surge in violence.
It is noted that the attack was the seventh in a series of armed attacks that occurred in Darfur from 19 to 26 July. On Saturday, France Presse (AFP) reported that a group of displaced persons who had arrived in a village in Southern Darfur province and had left because of the civil war several years earlier had been attacked. Twenty civilians were targeted and another 20 were injured.
Local authorities fear that the events could have a negative impact on the peace process in Darfur. In addition, the agricultural season, which is critical for the farming tribes living there, has been completely disrupted. According to Al Intibaha news portal on Sunday, Prime Minister Abdullah Hamduk signed a decree on “establishing a joint force to deploy in five regions of Darfur to protect citizens and ensure the agricultural season.
The armed conflict in Darfur, which is administratively divided into five provinces, erupted in 2003 as a result of a conflict between the Sudanese Arabized population supported by Sudanese authorities and rebel groups of local Negroids. The latter feared the region’s “economic marginalization” and launched an uprising against the central authorities. According to the UN, this fading conflict has claimed the lives of 300 thousand people, and more than 2.5 million Sudanese who lost their homes have become internally displaced. In 2006, a ceasefire was reached.