Amnesty calls on Sudan to investigate student killing

By

Michael Organ

The human rights NGO Amnesty International has called on the Sudanese government to investigate the killing of an eighteen year old student by intelligence agents.

On Tuesday, Abubakar Hassan Mohamed Taha, a first year engineering student at the University of Kordofan in El-Obeid died from a gunshot wound to the head after National Intelligence Security Services (NISS) agents opened fire on students who had been marching peacefully towards the office of students’ union to submit their list of pro-opposition candidates for union elections due to be held that day. It has been reported that another 27 students were injured, five of them seriously.

Shortly after the march had begun, intelligence agents intercepted the students in an attempt to prevent them from taking part in the elections.

One student stated that he saw 15 pick-up trucks arriving at the university full of intelligence agents armed with AK47 rifles and pistols, who then started shooting at the crowd. In addition to those injured, dozens of students were later detained, it also being reported that a vehicle and two motorcycles were burnt.

Muthoni Wanyeki, Amnesty’s regional director for East Africa, the Horn and the Great Lakes, stated “This violent attack is yet another shocking episode in a series of human rights violations against university students across Sudan and underlines the government’s determination to put out the last vestiges of dissent,” adding that “the reprehensible violence by state agents against the students must be thoroughly and impartially investigated and those responsible brought to justice.”

Michael Organ

Politics, Current Affairs, Art, Music, Film, Poetry, Fiction and Photography Editor for Tuck Magazine.