The use of explosive weapons in cities must stop

On April 15, we awoke to news that war had broken out in Sudan. From our screens, my family, our Sudanese community, and I followed media outlets and WhatsApp groups, hungry for information on what was happening overseas.

We watched from afar as fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces spilled into Khartoum, causing chaos, and transforming the once vibrant and familiar capital into a trail of destruction. We saw videos circulated around social media of frightened passengers cowering on the floor of the Khartoum International Airport as it came under heavy bombardment. We saw doctors wheeling their patients out of Al Shaheeda Salma hospital on stretchers and beds after it was bombed. As we watched the dissolution happening on our screens, we ran to our phones to check up on family and loved ones back home.

Eight months later we are still glued to our phones as Khartoum and other parts of Sudan continue to suffer under the bombardment.

As of December, the fighting had killed more than 12,000 people and displaced 6.7 million, in what the United Nations humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths has called “one of the worst humanitarian nightmares in recent history”.

I have watched in agony as cities have transformed into warzones and my mental image of “home” has crumbled under the barrage of rockets, artillery, and bombs. Like many other Sudanese families, we have had to mourn the deaths of loved ones from an imposed distance, including most recently my grandfather, who had lost access to health care due to the war.

From the onset of the conflict, explosive weapons have destroyed homes, including my own family’s home, entire neighbourhoods, and infrastructure, such as hospitals, schools, and water treatment plants. In early November, the monumental Shambat Bridge connecting Omdurman and Khartoum Bahri was bombed and destroyed. Truces that should have allowed civilians to evacuate cities under bombardment have collapsed or ended too quickly, effectively pinning civilians to their homes in precarious situations due to bombardment.

Explosive weapons encompass a range of surface-fired and air-dropped weapons and other munitions, including aerial bombs, artillery and mortar projectiles, and rockets and missiles. These weapons frequently are too inaccurate, or their blast radius is too large for them to be used in populated areas without causing unlawfully indiscriminate harm.

The situation in Sudan represents just one example of what happens when hostilities occur in cities. We also have Gaza, Syria, and Ukraine where we see the use of explosive weapons make cities unliveable.

In Syria, recent shelling and air raids in Idlib and Aleppo have displaced more than 120,000 people, while in Ukraine, Russian forces’ air raids, rocket attacks and other munitions have hit vital ports and grain facilities and damaged schools and hospitals among other civilian infrastructure.