Action point based on findings

• Improve casualty-tracking mechanisms to ensure an accurate picture of the victim assistance needs.

Casualties Overview

The Monitor recorded 23 casualties in 2016, all reported by the National Mine Action Center (NMAC) in Blue Nile, Kassala, and the four states of Darfur—Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western. Three casualties were killed and 20 injured. All the reported casualties were civilians. Seventeen of the casualties were male and six were female. Most of the casualties, 17, were children (14 boys and three girls), while six were adults (three men and three women). The majority of casualties, 10, were caused by ERW, two were caused by antipersonnel mines, and one by antivehicle mines.[1]

In 2016, NMAC increased the number of casualties recorded for 2015 to 57 (from a previously reported total of 26).[2] In 2015, the UN Mine Action Service (UNMAS) identified 73 casualties and another five casualties were reported in the contested region of Abyei.[3] It is not clear whether the new 2015 total provided by NMAC includes any 2015 data from UNMAS. Therefore, detail from the NMAC 2015 data was added to the Monitor global database and the total for Sudan therefore increased, but the number of casualties in Darfur for 2015 remained unchanged.

The 23 casualties reported in 2016 represents a significant decrease from the 130 reported in 2015 and the 40 reported in 2014. NMAC reported several challenges to data collection: a lack of funds, the remote locations where casualties live, and the movement of casualties from one place to another.[4] According to the founder of Jasmar Human Security Organization in 2014, the “number of landmine victims is underestimated in Sudan, due to the lack of accuracy in the collection of data. There are incidents that are never reported.”[5]

NMAC registered 2,050 mine/ERW casualties for the period from 2002 to the end of 2016, of which 588 people were killed and 1,462 injured.[6]

Cluster munition casualties

In 2016, as in 2014 and 2015, there were no reported cluster submunition casualties. A total of 39 casualties from cluster munitions in Sudan were recorded by the Monitor from 2000 through the end of 2013.

All casualties from submunitions in 2015 occurred in Darfur, in 2013 in Western Darfur; in 2012, in Southern Darfur and South Kordofan; and in 2011, in Blue Nile. Prior to 2009, casualties occurred in South Kordofan, Blue Nile, and Kassala.