“Sudan muffles critical speech through a long menu of direct and indirect tactics, violating the basic freedoms enshrined in the constitution,” said Daniel Bekele, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “Sudan should stop trying to silence anyone who says anything the government doesn’t like.”

Although Sudan’s 15 daily political newspapers have a greater semblance of freedom than the state-controlled broadcast media, the newspapers are subject to various methods of censorship and punitive measures for publishing articles on sensitive issues. The National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) is largely responsible for these tactics.

On April 3, 2013, NISS re-imposed direct pre-printing censorship on at least four independent dailies: al-Ayyam, al-Sahafa, al-Khartoum, and al-Youm al-Tali. The first two are being censored directly, required to clear the content of each edition with NISS officials in advance. The other two were later exempted from this process, but are still getting phone calls from security officials directing their coverage.

For example, after a police mutiny in West Darfur on April 21, an NISS official called al-Khartoum newspaper, one of the paper’s editors told Human Rights Watch: “They told us not to mention a single word outside the official statement of the Ministry of Interior on the events.”

On March 24, NISS confiscated al-Khartoum’s print run because the newspaper published a report about a protest planned by the families of six political detainees. Most of the detainees have been held for almost four months without any judicial review because they held talks in January with rebel groups in the Ugandan capital, Kampala.

When the paper’s editors asked the NISS official who had the issue confiscated for an explanation, he said the paper “has already crossed the red lines too many times,” the editor told Human Rights Watch.

In September 2009, President Omar Al-Bashir announced the end of more than a year of pre-publication censorship for all newspapers, a system under which NISS officials visited the newspaper offices every night to screen draft copies and expunge any objectionable content on a long list of sensitive issues.

The banned topics included the armed conflicts in the country’s peripheries and the indictment of Al-Bashir by the International Criminal Court (ICC). In announcing the decision to lift censorship, al-Bashir warned journalists not to cross the “red lines” and required chief editors of newspapers to sign a document obliging them to exercise “self-censorship.”

However, NISS officials continued to use various tactics to exercise censorship, ranging from making phone calls to issuing orders about coverage to confiscating entire editions or shutting down newspapers without court orders. On January 2, 2012, the NISS closed down the anti-government Ray Al-Sha’b and 10 days later the privately owned al-Wan, both without explanation. Al-Wan was allowed to resume publishing on March 15, 2012 while Ray Al-Sha’b remains closed.

On June 11, the NISS director-general, Mohammed Atta, suspended publication of the privately owned newspaper al-Tayyar, which remains closed. NISS suspended another privately owned daily, al-Jareeda, on September 27, but allowed it to resume publishing on December 15.

In August 2011, following South Sudan’s independence from Sudan, the NISS closed down six newspapers, including the anti-government Ajrass al-Hurriya, on the pretext that their shareholders include citizens from South Sudan. And in mid-2012, the government again stepped up harassment of journalists and censorship in the aftermath of fighting between Sudanese and South Sudanese forces at Heglig oil fields. In late 2011 and early 2012, NISS effectively blacklisted 15 journalists.

While many of the journalists were later allowed to resume work, Rasha Awad, a columnist, has not been permitted to write since NISS shut down Ajrass al-Hurriya, where she had worked. Haidar al-Mukashfi, a prominent columnist at al-Sahafa, was suspended for nearly a year, beginning on April 24, 2012, when he was summoned to the NISS media office in Khartoum, interrogated for four hours and ordered not to write again until he received further notice. He was only allowed to resume writing on April 12, 2013, after his editor-in-chief obtained permission from NISS.

More recently, the editor-in-chief of the newspaper al-Sahafa, al-Nur Ahmad al-Nur, said that NISS ordered him on April 3 to resign from his position because of articles the paper had run, or the NISS would ensure that the paper was closed down for good.

Sudan’s National Security Act of 2010 gives the NISS sweeping powers of arrest, search and seizure as well as immunity from prosecution for its agents. Sudan’s interim constitution of 2005 guarantees freedom of the press, however, and does not give the security apparatus any powers of arrest or authority over the press.

Sudan is a party to both the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and as such has undertaken legally binding obligations to respect free speech. The actions of the NISS against journalists and media outlets clearly violate these obligations, and the rights of Sudanese citizens, Human Rights Watch said.

“The security agency officials’ intimidation and threats of the news media are clearly designed to ensure that the Sudanese people are kept in the dark about sensitive topics that are of huge public interest” Bekele said. “The security’s agency’s censorship also underscores the need for urgent reform of national security laws in line with international standards.”

The first round of distributions consisted of two-month food rations for about 12,000 people in Geissan and 39,000 in Kurmuk, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) announced yesterday.

It plans to reach people in six localities before the rainy season begins in May but it still needs some $20 million to secure 17,000 metric tons of food for the response.

In what it called a “major breakthrough,” WFP last week announced that the first UN food rations reached conflict-affected people in Blue Nile state since 2011, when the isolated rural area near the South Sudan border was cut off by insecurity and movement restrictions imposed by the Government.

“While we continue to strive for access to all areas, this is still a major breakthrough which will enable us to assist those who continue to be displaced by the conflict or those who have decided to return to their homes and are in dire need of food assistance,” WFP Country Director Adnan Khan said at the time.

Fighting between the Sudanese armed forces and the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) broke out in the state after neighbouring South Sudan seceded under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended a decades-long civil war. The fighting in Blue Nile displaced and then isolated tens of thousands of people.

“The Darfur Development Strategy acknowledges that while current conditions may not be perfect, ‘the people are ready for change’,” the Secretary-General said in his message to the Conference.

The international donor forum hosted by Qatar wrapped up today after two days of pledging which organizers had hoped would raise $7.2 billion to cover reconstruction and development of Darfur over a six-year period. According to reports, at least $3.7 billion was pledged.

“We share a collective commitment to achieving a comprehensive and inclusive peace for the people of Darfur. Resolving the conflict there remains critical to consolidating peace and stability for Sudan as a whole,” said Mr. Ban.

He noted that the long-stalled effort to find a political solution to the conflict reached a turning point last July with the adoption of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur by the Government of Sudan and the Liberation and Justice Movement.

Last month, the Justice and Equality Movement-Sudan also agreed to sign on to the Doha Document.

Mr. Ban also urged the Government to cooperate in facilitating the work of the African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), humanitarian actors and international development partners throughout Darfur, while respecting human rights.

“The Government of Sudan must clearly demonstrate its commitment to fulfil its financial obligations to support recovery and development in Darfur,” Mr. Ban said.

Meanwhile, thousands of civilians are seeking protection, many of them with their livestock, near joint AU-UN peacekeeping teams in Muhajeria and Labado, East Darfur State, after attacks and “possible air strikes” on the towns.

“UNAMID reaffirms its commitment to protect displaced civilians,” the Mission said in a press release.

The peacekeeping mission is working with UN agencies to ascertain the best means of supporting aid delivery to the population, particularly the civilians concentrated around the team site.

“We in UNAMID condemn the use of force seen in the attack on Muhajeria and Labado towns in East Darfur. These actions only bring further suffering to the civilian population and undermine the peace process,” said the new Head of UNAMID and Joint Chief Mediator for the AU and UN, Mohamed Ibn Chambas. He officially takes up his post today.

According to the Mission, members of the Sudan Liberation Army led by Minni Minawi attacked and seized the towns on 6 April wounding at least three civilians, including a staff member from UNAMID.

“At both locations, UNAMID personnel reported several possible air strikes and are taking steps to ascertain the number of casualties caused by the fighting,” according to information in the statement.

Established in July 2007, UNAMID has the protection of civilians as its core mandate, but is also tasked with contributing to security for humanitarian assistance, monitoring and verifying implementation of agreements and assisting with an inclusive political process, among other responsibilities.

According to UN figures estimates, some 300,000 people have been killed in Darfur since the conflict between rebels, Government forces and allied militiamen erupted in 2003 and about 2.7 million others have had to flee their homes. Both sides have been accused of numerous human rights abuses.

“While we continue to strive for access to all areas, this is still a major breakthrough which will enable us to assist those who continue to be displaced by the conflict or those who have decided to return to their homes and are in dire need of food assistance,” said WFP’s Country Director in Sudan, Adnan Khan.

Fighting between the Sudanese armed forces and the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) broke out in Blue Nile state in September 2011, after neighbouring South Sudan seceded under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended a decades-long civil war. The fighting in Blue Nile displaced and then isolated tens of thousands of people.

“We are giving a two-month ration for this first round of distribution, following an assessment which we carried out early last month in two of the areas most severely affected by the conflict, Geissan and Kurmuk,” said WFP Programme Officer Arduino Mangoni. He is in Geissan leading a team that monitors the distribution of food to 12,000 people. WFP plans to reach an additional 39,000 people in Kurmuk.

Additional WFP staff are in four other localities in Blue Nile state to determine how people are coping with their food needs, what food is available in the market and at what price.

“The overall plan is to assist all those we can reach in the six localities before the onset of the rainy season in May,” Mr. Khan said.

WFP has said it will need an additional $20.5 million to buy 17,000 metric tons of food it estimates will be needed.

Between them, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council – China, France, Russia, the UK and the USA – are responsible for over half of the almost US$100 billion total annual global trade in conventional weapons.

The same five states will be pivotal to finalizing an effective Arms Trade Treaty with strong human rights protections at the conference taking place at the UN from 18-28 March.

All this week in the run-up to that historic meeting, Amnesty International activists and supporters are holding a “Global Week of Action” to call on world leaders to adopt an effective Arms Trade Treaty with strong human rights protections.

“It’s clear that the five permanent members of the UN Security Council are responsible for the lion’s share of arms deals across borders – and so collectively they must shoulder the greatest burden in bringing the poorly regulated global arms trade in check,” said Helen Hughes, researcher on arms transfers at Amnesty International.

The 12-page briefing, Major powers fuelling atrocities, includes examples of arms transfers from each of the five countries to states around the world, where they are likely to be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law.

According to the briefing, the USA – by far the world’s largest arms trader – frequently exports “non-standard ammunition” to its friends and allies. Rather than being US-made, these arms and equipment are sourced from abroad – typically from the former Soviet Union and Eastern European companies.

It adds, that a  September 2012 contract between the US military and Yemen lists 1 million rounds of sniper rifle ammunition as well as thousands of RPG rockets and mortar bombs. The USA has become Yemen’s largest supplier of military equipment, and in 2011 delivered arms worth US$4.8 million.

The USA is among countries that have tried to weaken the draft text of the Arms Trade Treaty by seeking to exclude certain types of weapons and ammunition from its scope, Amnesty says.

Amnesty International is pressing for the final treaty to cover all types of weapons and munitions for use in military and internal security operations, as well as related equipment, parts and technology.

“No opt-outs should be allowed, and to be effective, the treaty must have a ‘Golden Rule’ requiring states to halt arms exports when there is a substantial risk the arms will be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law,” said Brian Wood, Amnesty International’s Head of Arms Control and Human Rights.

“Also, the treaty should completely ban the transfer of arms that would aid or assist in crimes under international law, including extra-judicial killings, torture and enforced disappearances.”

State-owned companies in China account for the bulk of the country’s exports of conventional arms. In recent years they have shipped to countries including Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan, the briefing says.

France has sold vehicles that can be militarized (“véhicules civils militarisables”) to Sudan, where they have been used by government-backed Janjaweed militia who have committed gross human rights violations in the country’s Darfur region, according to the briefing.

Syria historically received the majority of its weapons and munitions from the Soviet Union, and has continued to do so from Russia, the world’s second-largest arms trader by value, according to Amnesty.

Since 2011 when protesters were being killed across the country for calling for freedoms and even after the situation escalated into an internal armed conflict between government and opposition forces in July 2012, Russia and China have blocked efforts at the UN to impose an arms embargo and sanctions on Syria.  Amnesty International has documented a range of Russian and Soviet-era arms and military equipment – ranging from aircraft to cluster bombs – being used in Syria.

“While it won’t be a panacea for all of the world’s misuse of arms, if we get a strong Arms Trade Treaty it will be an important step towards achieving much more security and human rights protection for billions of people who today live in fear,” said Wood.

The UN-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur (UNAMID) said fighting resumed last week between the Abbala and Beni Hussein tribes in the Aji Heir area – approximately 10 kilometres west of El Sireaf, where the internally displaced persons gathered.

“Our joint priority with the Government, UNAMID and all partners in the region is to ensure the safety and security of all civilians in the area and to provide much needed humanitarian assistance,” the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Ali Al-Za’tari, said in a statement issued today.

The current humanitarian situation in the El Sireaf locality and in North Darfur follows an outbreak of violence on 5 January between the Abbala and Beni Hussein tribes in the Jebel Amir area of North Darfur, resulting in a mass displacement of more than 100,000 people.

UN and partnering aid organizations delivered over 700 metric tones of food and other relief supplies to the area in the last month, according to the statement.

Mr. Al-Za’tari said the deadly tensions highlight “once again” the vulnerability of civilians in the area and cautioned that more civilians will flee the area unless a lasting solution to the conflict is found.

The latest fighting has reportedly killed more than 50 people and wounded dozens more.

UNAMID said it airlifted 37 wounded people, including a woman and two children, to El Fasher for medical treatment on 24 February, and carried 2,700 kilograms of medical and other supplies.

“I call for the immediate end to the tribal clashes in North Darfur,” UNAMID’s Officer-in-Charge, Mohamed Yonis, said in a press release.

“There is no solution to this conflict other than one that is driven by good-faith efforts toward reconciliation.”

The Mission has been supporting reconciliation initiatives between the two sides and conducting security escorts to facilitate humanitarian access, and has significantly increased the number of daily patrols in North Darfur areas most affected by the violence.

“My hope is that, in the upcoming weeks, the tensions in the area will ease and the reconciliation process will resume,” said Mr. Yonis.

The High Commissioner was particularly concerned about the welfare of the 60,000 civilians living in Yida and he urged the refugees there to move to sites deeper inside South Sudan and located in a safer, healthier and easier to access environment.

“This is the most threatening situation I have ever seen in a refugee camp. Not only because it is close to a war zone, but because of access – all things have to be brought in by plane,” he said during his visit. Yida is located in wetland in Sudan’s Unity state just 12 kilometres from the border.

“The proximity of refugees in Yida to a volatile conflict zone raises grave concerns about the security of refugees,” said UNHCR Representative in South Sudan Mireille Girard, echoing the concerns of Guterres. “This is the most dangerous refugee site in South Sudan.”

Tens of thousands of civilians have fled to Sudan since the middle of last year to escape fighting in Sudan’s South Kordofan state between the Sudan Armed Forces and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North. The flow almost ceased during the just ended rainy season, when Yida becomes a virtual island, but it is picking up strongly and UNHCR is prepared for a major influx.

Guterres, who was accompanied during his Yida visit by South Sudan’s Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management Joseph Lual Achuil, said that despite the security concerns he was “very encouraged by the government’s commitment to make sure armed people do not enter the camp.”

UNHCR has been looking at new sites in safer areas where it will be easier to provide aid and basic services, including health care and education. Guterres urged those he met to move, while noting that “the people who arrive [in Yida] are dehydrated, malnourished, exhausted.” Most of the new arrivals are women and children, while almost 70 per cent of those in Yida are aged under 18 years.

A large new influx of refugees is also expected from Sudan’s Blue Nile state into South Sudan’s Upper Nile state, where UNHCR runs four camps sheltering more than 110,000 refugees. “We will be doing everything we can to mobilize the capacity to respond to the needs of the people who have suffered so much,” Guterres said.

The High Commissioner, who met South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir Mayardit and other top officials during his visit, appealed for a political solution to end the hostilities. Meanwhile, urgent financial support is needed for the emergency operations in South Sudan.

South Sudan hosts some 200,000 refugees, including more than 170,000 in Unity and Upper Nile states.

In a report, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) stated that the outbreak has now affected 17 localities in central, south, west and north Darfur, with 194 cases reported – a significant increase from the 84 initial cases reported at the start of the outbreak.

An estimated 200,000 cases of yellow fever, which is caused by a virus spread by mosquitoes, are recorded worldwide each year, with as many as 30,000 deaths reported, according to WHO. Patients experience jaundice, as well as other symptoms, such as fever and vomiting. There is no specific treatment for the disease and vaccination is the single most important measure for prevention.

In addition to monitoring the disease throughout Darfur, WHO said it is training more than 225 health workers in the region on disease surveillance, case management and infection prevention and control.

The health agency is also working with the Sudanese Ministry of Health to dispatch technical teams to help tame the outbreak by conducting investigations on new cases, meeting with local community leaders to raise awareness of the disease, and provide blood bank supplies as well as protective equipment to affected areas.

The report’s recommendations also include strengthening disease surveillance in eastern Darfur, continuing laboratory testing of patients from newly affected localities, and finalizing a vaccination plan that identifies resources available as well as partners to implement it.

Sudan has said that four Israeli aircraft fired missiles that hit a military factory and killed two people in the Sudanese capital on Wednesday. Israel has not reacted to the allegations.

“Four military planes attacked the Yarmouk plant … We think that Israel is behind it,” Information Minister Ahmed Belal Osman said.

A huge fire broke out late on Tuesday at the Yarmouk military factory in the south of the capital which was rocked by several explosions, witnesses said. Firefighters took more than two hours to extinguish the fire at Sudan’s main factory for ammunition and small arms, according to Reuters.

Sudan on Wednesday demanded that the UN Security Council condemn Israel after it accused it of carrying out an air attack on the Sudanese weapons factory.

The foreign ministry of Israel, has long accused Sudan as an arms smuggling route to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip via neighboring Egypt.

A top Israeli defense official said Thursday that Sudan is a “dangerous terrorist state,” although Israel has refused to directly comment that it was responsible for the attack.

In 2009, a convoy carrying weapons in northeastern Sudan was targeted from the air, killing dozens. It was widely believed that Israel carried out the attack on weapons shipment headed for Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip. Israel never confirmed or denied that.

Meanwhile, the United States closed its embassy in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum on Wednesday due to protests outside the mission, coinciding with an airstrike that hit a weapons factory in Khartou, pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat reported on Thursday.

According to Al-Hayat, there was speculation in Khartoum that the closing of the US embassy indicated the US had prior knowledge of the attack. The airstrike caused a huge explosion and fire at an arms factory that killed two people.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said several mortar rounds landed near the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) offices, a local school and a local police station. No group has claimed responsibility for yesterday’s attack. As a precautionary measure, UN staff have been sent to a base of the UN Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA), a disputed area between Sudan and South Sudan.

UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan Ali Al-Za’tari called the attack a reprehensible violation of international humanitarian law. According to media reports from Sudan, there were a number of civilian casualties.

“UN and humanitarian partners have not been able to deliver assistance to people in need in the SPLM-North controlled areas of South Kordofan for quite some time, but are continuing to provide relief assistance to people affected by the fighting in government-controlled areas of the state,” OCHA spokesperson Jens Laerke told reporters in Geneva, using the acronym for the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N).

Lat month the UN Security Council voiced grave concern about the worsening humanitarian situation in South Kordofan and neighbouring Blue Nile state and urged the Sudanese Government to expedite the unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance to the affected civilian populations as rapidly as possible.

The two states, which lie on the border with South Sudan, have been beset by fighting between Sudanese forces and the SPLM-N since last year. The SPLM-N was previously part of the rebel movement that fought for the independence of South Sudan, which seceded from Sudan last year.