Country: Sudan

Group: Christians

Date Finalized: October 18, 2021

Team: Mason McNeel (lead), Johanna McCombs, Zaida Arellano Reyes

With the majority religion in Sudan being Muslim, Christians make up only a small minority of the population — around 3% (Minorities Rights Group, 2021). Christians originally settled in Sudan to escape religious persecution from Egypt, but discrimination, particularly the pressure to convert to Islam, soon spread to Sudan. In the 1800’s, the Sudanese government forced Christians to convert to Islam and intermarry with Muslims. In 1957, the Sudan government declared strict Islamic law which allowed greater discrimination against Christians in Sudan (Canada: Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, 1989). By the 1980s, the government escalated discrimination against Christians to targeted violence, being linked to the murder of Christian church leaders and destruction of any type of Christian building, including hospitals, schools, and bombings of churches during Sunday service (Copnall, 2015; Brock, 2013). In the late 1900’s, the government relocated over 170,000 people to “peace camps” which were used for Arabization of non-Muslim religions. The government routinely separated children from their families in peace camps, enforcing the study of the Quran and changing the childrens’ names to those of Muslim affiliation. In 1995, the government kidnapped Christian children and detaining them in peace camps. During the same time period, the government used displaced persons camps to convert Christians fleeing from the Sudanese civil war to Islam, typically withholding critical resources from non-Muslims and imprisoning, torturing, flogging, or killing those who refused to convert (RefCanada: Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, 2001). In 2014, the government gave a Sudanese woman the death sentence for refusing to abandon her faith, but due to international attention the government allowed her to flee the country. In 2016, the Sudanese government informed 26 Christian congregations that they would demolish their churches (Minority Rights Group International, 2021).

The Sudanese government has performed ethnic cleansing in the Nuba mountains, and conversion to Christianity is a crime punishable by death (Open Doors, 2021; Copnall, 2015; Minority Rights Group International, 2021). In 1999 and again in 2016, the United States labeled Sudan as a “Country of Particular Concern” under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 for violations against religious freedom (United States Department of State, 2016). The Sudanese government is obviously making an attempt to suppress Christianity, making this a clear case of ethnocide. The data is evaluated at a 3/3 with clear proof of ethnocide being provided from many quality sources.

Sources

  1. Brock, L. (2013). The martyrs of Sudan: Yesterday, today, tomorrow. Retrieved from  https://50days.org/2013/05/the-martyrs-of-sudan-yesterday-today-tomorrow/
  2. Canada: Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. (1989). Refworld | Sudan: Conflict between Christians and Muslims in Sudan. Sudan: Conflict between Christians and Muslims in Sudan. https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6ab2888.html
  3. Copnall, J. (2015). Are Christians in Sudan facing persecution? BBC News. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-33196289
  4. Minorities Rights Group International (2021). Sudan. Retrieved from https://minorityrights.org/country/sudan/
  5. United States Department of State. (2016). 2015 Report on International Religious Freedom—Sudan. Refworld. https://www.refworld.org/docid/57add82615.html