Spotlight on Sudan

In Depth

Observations on Sudanese chattel slavery by the experts at the Sudan Human Rights Organization
Official findings of United Nations "rapparteurs"
First-hand experiences of Sudanese slaves freed by Christian Solidarity International
Slave redemption FAQ

More Resources

SudanActivism.com: Find out what you can do to stop genocide and slavery in Sudan
Escape from Slavery, by Francis Bok: the autobiography of a former Sudanese slave
Slave redemption in Sudan: discussion and debate
Human Rights Watch reports on Sudan
Smith College's Eric Reeves analyzes and reports on Sudan

To find out more about what you can do to stop slavery and genocide in Sudan, visit SudanActivism.com.

Sudan's government is a radical regime that terrorizes its own population with brutal slave raids. Amidst civil war and inter-ethnic strife, the Sudanese government has launched a great revival of the country's once virtually-extinct institution of black chattel slavery. The victims: women and children abducted by militiamen during devastating raids.

Map of Sudan Sudan means "land of the blacks" in Arabic, and for centuries black Africans were abducted in Sudan as part of the Arabian slave trade. Sudan's borders — drawn by the British during colonial times- encompass Muslim Arabs in the North and black Africans of various faiths in the South. A radical fundamentalist movement pressured the government to impose Sha'ria (Islamic law) on all of Sudan in 1983 — at which time slave raids were reintroduced against black African villages in the South and Nuba Mountains.

A 1989 military coup by the fundamentalist General Omar el-Bashir spurred a dramatic increase in slave raids, which still continue today. Armed by the government, militiamen destroy villages and take their pay in human booty. Grown men are shot, but women and children are the marauders' most prized reward. Forced labor without pay, severe beatings, acute hunger, forced religious and cultural conversion, rape, and ritual female genital mutilation are grim realities for the tens of thousands of children and young mothers now in bondage.

In recent years, the violence has not remained limited to the South. Since 2003, the government-backed Janjaweed Militia has viciously attacked black African Muslims in the Western, Darfur region—destroying villages and farmland, murdering civilians, and abducting women and children in a pattern similar to the slave raids in the South.

The statistics are staggering—violence in the South and West has resulted in over 2 million deaths, 6.6 million internally displaced persons, and 576,000 refugees. Click here to learn more about the history of conflict in Sudan.