Access to the Inaccessible — Documenting Darfur Human Rights Violations from Space
With advances in technology, more commercial satellites are being launched into space, creating competition that not only drives the price down but also covers more of the globe in any given day. Since the first commercial high resolution satellite images became available in 1999 with the IKONOS satellite, there has been a steady stream of commercial earth observing satellite launches. Today, the dream of mapping the planet on a daily basis is becoming more of a reality with the development of more cost-effective microsatellites. This flush of satellites in the market has raised the bar in the industry, leading to better revisit times to remote locations, such as Darfur, along with better resolution to create undeniable evidence of human rights violations.
Since 2003, Sudanese government security forces have had an ongoing military campaign to eliminate the armed opposition in Darfur. These last thirteen years in Darfur have been marked by violence and civilian destruction , driving the continual displacement of populations. Journalists, relief workers, and human rights activists have long been denied access to the region, increasing the challenge to fully understand the situation on the ground, but commercially available satellite imagery has allowed a view into this inaccessible part of the world.
Another major counter-insurgency offensive began on January 15, 2016, in the Jebel Marra region of Darfur which has historically been controlled by Abdel Wahid’s Sudan Liberation Army (SLA-AW). According to reports, tanks, artillery and aerial bombings were used to conduct the government offensive over a two-week period and was followed by ongoing looting and razing of villages. The hostilities between the SLA-AW and Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) has led to the displacement of many tens of thousands of civilians, according to estimates by aid agencies.
The Jebel Marra region covers over 4000 square kilometers and spans across North, Central and South Darfur. An in-depth analysis of 195 square kilometers of land was conducted using natural color and false-colored infrared high resolution imagery taken between March 2015 and May 2016 to document evidence of new damage and destruction in villages along with other significant changes to illustrate the situation in the region.
Across the areas analyzed, evidence of damage and destruction was visible in 56 villages, including three villages located less than four kilometers from the African Union and UN operation in Sortoni (UNAMID), where thousands of internally displaced people have gathered.
Very few villages were left untouched suggesting many more villages in the Jebel Marra area have been impacted. The level of destruction from fire in many of the villages echoes the same systematic scorched-earth tactics used in the past. With the insecurity and displacement continuing through the March planting season, those villages that may have been completely or partially spared will still experience hunger. Read the full research report here.
A note on the region from Amnesty International Consultant, Hannah Waller:
“As ground access to the scorched region is nearly impossible, satellite imagery analysis provides a window into a conflict that many dismiss as resolved. Access challenges are exacerbated by the fact that Darfur is a data-poor region, with limited or nonexistent coordinate locations for remote villages. In order to document the destruction of villages, research first had to track down and identify specific locations. Through an extensive process involving researchers, Darfur field contacts, and many layers and points in Google Earth, we were able to identify upwards of 345 named villages and 180 unnamed villages throughout the Jebel Marra region. This data led analysts to know where to look for destruction, and was used for several sub-regional maps of Darfur. The shapefile data will be distributed through open-source channels so that future researchers can ‘access the inaccessible’ in Jebel Marra, Darfur.”
Do you want to contribute some time and effort to research on human rights in Darfur? The latest Amnesty Decoders project, launching in October, will call on digital volunteers to help analyze vast swaths of satellite imagery from Darfur. Your help is greatly appreciated.
