Recognizing the Actions of the Rapid Support Forces and Allied Militias in the Darfur Region of Sudan Against Non-Arab Ethnic Communities As Acts of Genocide

Floor Speech

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Mr. JAMES. Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Africa Subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, I have time and time again brought attention to the crises going on on the African Continent while the rest of the world looks the other way.

Mr. Speaker, where is the press? Where are the celebrities? Silent.

Today, Sudan is the largest humanitarian crisis in the world, with close to 9 million people internally displaced. Over 800,000 people face catastrophic hunger. Sudanese civilians are scattered around the region as they flee escalating violence by warring parties: the RSF and SAF.

Diplomatic efforts have failed, and the war rages in Khartoum and Darfur, where an abundance of evidence points to genocide being committed by RSF forces against the Masalit and likely against other non-Arab communities, as well.

In West Darfur, the RSF has systematically targeted the Masalit ethnic group. From April to June 2023, up to 15,000 people were killed in a series of coordinated attacks. Survivors said they were targeted explicitly because they were Masalit, according to a report compiled by the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights. The RSF has attacked, burned, and destroyed homes, entire villages, IDP camps, and shelters that primarily hosted Masalit people.

The governor of West Darfur was executed by the RSF shortly after he publicly decried the ongoing genocide, calling for international intervention to protect the remaining population.

My resolution will formally declare the atrocities committed by the RSF and their allied militia as acts of genocide. For far too long, the world has stood by as we watch a repeat of history and as external actors, including the UAE, Russia, and Iran, fuel the slaughter of innocents and the rape of women and children without repercussion.

In 2003, the Government of Sudan and its proxy, Janjaweed militia, explicitly targeted the non-Arab Fur, Zaghawa, and Masalit ethnic communities through mass killings, forced displacement, destruction of farms, horrific violence against women and girls, aerial bombings of civilians, and the blocking of humanitarian assistance. Today, the RSF, formed out of these elements of the Janjaweed militia, continues and is using the exact same playbook.

In 2004, it was Congress that took the lead to bring attention to these heinous acts. President George W. Bush's administration followed by declaring genocide in Darfur. By September 2004, we had executed. The Bush administration and Congress were clear-eyed in addressing the plight of the Sudanese people.

Sadly, today, President Biden has failed the Sudanese people and has left another part of the world on fire for President Trump's new administration. For now, Congress will again take the lead.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support passage of H. Res. 1328, which passed out of committee on a unanimous, bipartisan basis.

The evidence is clear. The RSF's actions are unequivocally amounting to genocide and must be declared as such. The press must do their duty to the world and report on this heinous genocide and crime against humanity or they are failing in their mandate. They cannot talk about defending freedom of speech if they do not defend the lives of people in Darfur.

Mr. Speaker, I call on all parties and their backers to bring an end to this devastating war. We, for our part, in a bipartisan manner, will do everything we can to support the Sudanese people without delay.

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