Lawmakers Call for Sanctioning Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces

Four congressional committee leaders urged the Biden administration on April 19 to consider sanctioning Sudan's Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and its leader, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, commonly known as Hemedti, for human rights violations.

Sens. Ben Cardin, D-Md., and Jim Risch, R-Idaho, the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Reps. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, and Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., the chairman and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a letter to President Joe Biden that the RSF, under Hemedti’s leadership, “has committed abuses deserving of sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act.”

The RSF’s actions include killing human rights activists and pro-democracy protesters, the letter says. The RSF is a militia group that has been fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces for a year.