Anneliese Dodds

Mr Speaker, I am very grateful to you for granting this urgent question. The scale of suffering in Sudan’s war on civilians is almost impossible to comprehend. A population the size of Australia’s are living in acute hunger. A population the size of London’s have been forced to flee their home. There are consistent reports of conflict-related sexual violence, and consistent warnings that if the international community do not act, we will effectively see a slow-motion Srebrenica. The Minister set out the reports of what may have happened at El Fasher’s maternity hospital yesterday evening; 460 people could have been slaughtered in a maternity hospital—patients, their companions and medical staff. This surely must be a turning point in the war, and for the international community’s focus on it. The Minister talked about the special representative’s contact, but what specific conversations have the Foreign Secretary and Ministers had with their counterparts, particularly in the Quad countries—the United States said it wanted to take a leadership position on these issues—but also in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates on the issue of civilian protection? Secondly, I was pleased to hear that an emergency session of the Security Council has been called. What will the UK Government press other countries in the UN to commit to at that session? Thirdly, are the Government confident that the arms control export regime has been robust in this case, given recent reports? What is the Government’s assessment of claims that El Fasher appears to be at the start of a systematic and intentional process of ethnic cleansing of Fur, Zaghawa and Berti indigenous communities, through forced displacement and summary execution? Finally, what are the Government doing to prevent what is happening in El Fasher from also happening in Tawila, to which so many thousands of terrified civilians have fled?