Call for Establishing a National Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Mass Crimes

By: Brigadier Police (Retired), Omar Mohamed Osman

The British newspaper The Guardian has recently published an article about the discovery of a mass grave containing more than 500 bodies of persons believed to have been tortured or starved to death before being secretly buried inside a Rapid Support Forces base north of Khartoum.
According to military sources, survivors were found in poor health conditions, with signs of systematic torture. At the same time, Human Rights Watch described the site as “one of the largest scenes of horrific crimes in Sudan,” calling for an international investigation.
This tragedy underscores the urgent need to establish a national commission for missing persons and victims of mass killing, which will document cases of enforced disappearance, provide answers to families of the victims, and work to achieve justice through clear legal mechanisms.
Such a commission should include a national database for missing persons, receive reports from families through field offices and hotlines, and provide them with legal and psychological support. It should also coordinate efforts between the police and the public prosecution to conduct thorough investigations and cooperate with specialized international organizations to ensure justice is achieved and the truth is revealed.
Some may ask: Why don’t the police and prosecution handle this file? These cases require cooperation between several parties, including the law, forensics, and international coordination, tasks beyond existing institutions’ traditional capabilities. The commission’s independence also gives it greater flexibility and effectiveness, which enhances its credibility in the eyes of public opinion.
Sudan is not the only country that has faced such challenges. After the Balkan War, the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) was established in 1996 and contributed to identifying thousands of victims through DNA analysis. In Colombia, the Missing Persons Unit was established in 2016 after the peace agreement and focused on searching for mass graves. As for Mexico, it established a national commission to search for the missing in 2017 to address cases of enforced disappearance.
Every day that passes without the establishment of this commission means the loss of evidence and the difficulty of identifying victims, especially as the bodies decompose over time. Thousands of families also live in constant anxiety without knowing the fate of their loved ones. Several reports indicate that this mass grave is not the first, as satellite images have documented the existence of other graves in several Sudanese states.
The establishment of the National Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Mass Crimes is no longer an option but a national and humanitarian need because the absence of justice will keep thousands of families in a state of painful waiting and threatens to obscure the facts without holding those responsible accountable.

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