World Court to hear Sudan genocide case against UAE

The World Court said on Friday it would hear a case brought by Sudan demanding emergency measures against the United Arab Emirates and accusing the Gulf state of violating obligations under the Genocide Convention by arming paramilitary forces.

There was no immediate reaction from the United Arab Emirates which had said this month it would seek to get Sudan’s case dismissed, and that the legal complaint lacked “any legal or factual basis”.

Sudan has accused the UAE of arming the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) which have been fighting the Sudanese army in a two-year-old civil war – a charge the UAE denies but U.N. experts and U.S. lawmakers have found credible.

Sudan’s complaint to the Hague-based International Court of Justice – known as the World Court – is in connection with intense ethnic-based attacks by the RSF and allied Arab militias against the non-Arab Masalit tribe in 2023 in West Darfur, documented in detail by Reuters.

Those attacks were determined to be genocide by the United States in January.

Sudan has asked for the court to impose emergency measures to order the Emirates to prevent genocidal acts in Darfur.

The court said it would hear Sudan’s request on April 10.

As cases before the ICJ can take years to reach a final conclusion states can ask for emergency measures which are meant to ensure the dispute between the states does not escalate in the meantime. 

Sudan’s booming wartime gold trade flows through the UAE

Sudan’s gold industry has become the lifeblood of its war, with nearly all of the trade channelled through the United Arab Emirates, enriching both the army and paramilitaries, according to official and NGO sources.

The two-year conflict has decimated Sudan’s economy, yet last month the army-backed government announced record gold production in 2024.

Demand for the country’s vast gold reserves was “a key factor in prolonging the war,” Sudanese economist Abdelazim al-Amawy told news agency AFP.

“To solve the war in Sudan, we have to follow the gold, and we arrive at the UAE,” said Marc Ummel, a researcher with development organisation Swissaid who tracks African gold smuggling to the Gulf country.

In a statement emailed to AFP in response to this story, an official said that “the UAE firmly rejects any groundless allegations regarding the smuggling and profiting of gold from Sudan during this humanitarian catastrophe”.

The official also said: “The UAE takes the regulation of its gold sector very seriously and will continue to maintain its position as a leading ethical gold hub, actively preventing illicit flows from entering the market.”

But according to Sudanese officials, mining industry sources and Swissaid’s research, nearly all of Sudan’s gold flows to the UAE, via official trade routes, smuggling and direct Emirati ownership of the government’s currently most lucrative mine.

In February, the state-owned Sudan Mineral Resources Company said gold production reached 64 tonnes in 2024, up from 41.8 tonnes in 2022.

Legal exports brought $1.57 billion into the state’s depleted coffers, central bank figures show.

But “nearly half of the state’s production is smuggled across borders,” SMRC director Mohammed Taher told AFP from Port Sudan.

Nearly 2,000 kilometres (1,240 miles) away, on Sudan’s borders with South Sudan and the Central African Republic, lie the mines controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

Much of the gold produced by both sides is smuggled to Chad, South Sudan and Egypt, before reaching the UAE, according to mining industry sources and experts.