Fighters from Sudans paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have broken into an animal sanctuary on the outskirts of Khartoum, shooting and taking away one camel and two gazelles, the sanctuary's manager told Middle East Eye.
Mansour Babiker Hamid, the chief executive of Sudan Animal Rescue, said this was the second time the RSF had stormed the zoo in the last week, stealing animals for meat and leaving the remaining staff terrified.
There are four workers at the zoo right now, Hamid told MEE. Yesterday I spoke to one of them, Santino, who told me the RSF had attacked one of the camels in the zoo in order to eat it. The camel was shot and taken with them, he said.
The day before, a different group stormed the zoo, assaulted two deer and took them away to eat, Hamid said. The camel that was shot was a calf and was with its mother at the time. Two gazelles were also taken.
Sudan Animal Rescue is 35km from the centre of Khartoum, Sudans capital. It houses 26 lions and five hyenas, as well as different types of wild cat, ostriches and birds, monkeys and reptiles, according to Hamid, who spoke to MEE on the phone.
