Johannesburg – Sudanese opposition activists have once again rallied in the capital Khartoum, calling for an independent investigation into the June massacre of protesters outside military headquarters in the capital Khartoum after dismissing an investigation into the killings by the attorney general as a whitewash of events.
Addressing a press conference over the weekend Attorney General, Fatteh Al Rahman Saeed, asserted that "only" 87 people were killed and 168 wounded during the attack.
The attack was carried out by security forces, specifically members of the notorious Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by the Transitional Military Council (TMC) and comprising among others former members of the Janjaweed militia, which committed mass atrocities during the Darfur Genocide – to disperse the June 3 sit-in.
Saeed blamed rogue personnel for the excesses saying that three officers, specifically one from the RSF, had disobeyed orders - which were to only clear an area known for drug dealing - by ordering the protesters be beaten and forcibly removed, the Sudan Tribune reported.
However, according to the protest-aligned Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors well over 100 demonstrators were killed and 700 others wounded during the attack and in the subsequent days of violence.
The attorney general also denied claims of sexual assaults and rape, burning of bodies during the attack, before claiming that the cadavers found in the River Nile had no relation to the attack on the sit-in despite angry survivors stating they had seen members of the RSF throwing the bodies into the river.
The Sudanese attorney general’s assertions have also been dismissed by the Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA), an umbrella group spearheading the nationwide protests, which stated the prosecutors had no credibility.
The SPA has also demanded that the accused be identified by their full names, rather than by their initials as mentioned in the prosecutor's report.
Meanwhile, opposition activists have warned that they are now left with no alternative other than to continue their protests until a credible investigation is carried out.