Khalil is 9 years old. He had a childhood with
no worries until last November.
That's when Sudan's Rapid Support Forces came to his hometown,
Aeginina and attacked.
Khalil. Still can't speak about what happened that day.
They shot from all four sides like fire.
There were many RSF fighters.
I don't know which side the bullet came from.
We only found him shot.
Khalil was shot in the leg and needed medical care
quickly.
The family fled to Chad,
where doctors amputated his leg.
Before this attack, the RSF and allied Arab militias took
control of a nearby Sudanese Army base.
Then they went door to door in Halia's hometown,
systematically looking for members of African ethnic groups like the
Masalid community.
They raped girls, burned people alive,
executed boys and men. They left bodies on the streets
to rot.
Khalia's father buried 28 people that day,
including his nephew.
The men had shot him in the head
and his wife in the stomach.
I found them inside their house.
During this attack, he remembers RSF fighters using racial slurs.
They abused us. They said you are Nawab Africans.
We will kill all of you.
You won't have any land.
This land will be under our authority
and we will decide who will cultivate it.
It's a genocide against us.
They don't want any black people to remain.
the United Nations says the RSF and its allies killed
an estimated
15,000 people in ethnically motivated massacres in Darfur.
Human Rights Watch has also warned of a possible genocide
against the mass elite in the region.
First they killed doctors, then they killed teachers,
they killed religious leaders and most people with an education.
They wanted to end the people.
Abdul Rahman speaks as a community leader and from personal
experience.
The same men he prayed with in the mosque in
the evening abducted 12 members of his family and executed
them.
His son, a doctor, was killed while working at the
hospital.
AB Rahman surviving family also sought safety in Chad,
but suspicion remains. AB Rahman says their Arab neighbors in
Sudan helped the RSF in pointing out mass elite houses
during their attack
and some of them now live in a nearby refugee
camp.
There are other witnesses who corroborate this claim
and some who deny it,
like this Arab community leader.
Civilians were never killed. This is a lie.
The mass elite are lying
of those who came to Chad,
nobody has hurt them.
The divide runs deep. To prevent conflict,
residents tell us ethnic Arab and ethnic African refugees are
staying in separate camps.
In their camp, Khalil's parents are happy to watch their
son grow up in safety,
and it's filling them with hope for the future.
When my son grows up,
I hope he'll have a business.
I imagine many things for him,
working at the mosque and having children too.
I just want my son to be happy in this
life.
Now. As before, Khalil is happiest when playing football with
his friends.
The scars of Darfur will remain,
but they aren't stopping him from doing what he loves.