SUDAN
Legal framework on freedom of religion and actual application
The 2019 constitutional framework under the transitional government of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, marked a historic break from decades of repression. It guaranteed non-discrimination (Article 4), protection of religious rights (Article 43), and freedom of religion and worship (Article 56), aiming to reverse Sudan’s legacy of religious persecution, which had driven many non-Muslims to emigrate and contributed to South Sudan’s 2011 secession.[1]
In July 2020, the transitional government passed the Fundamental Rights and Freedoms Act of 2020, which enacted major reforms including repealing the public order law, abolishing flogging for blasphemy, banning female genital mutilation and allowing non-Muslims to drink alcohol. It allowed women to travel without explicit permission from a father or husband and initiated education reforms to promote inclusivity.[2] Apostasy was officially also decriminalised when the criminal code’s Article 126 — which had mandated the death penalty for apostasy — was revoked.[3]
In late 2020, to encourage the return of religious minorities, the transitional government attempted to change the school curriculum concerning religion rendering it less discriminatory against non-Muslims. By January 2021, however, the effort faced criticism from all sides with Omar al-Garrai, the director of Sudan’s National Center for Curriculum and Educational Research, receiving death threats after some imams publicly called him an “infidel”.[4] Al-Garrai resigned, and the initiative collapsed.
In March 2021, General Al-Hilu, President Salva Kiir of South Sudan and General al-Burhan, then leader of the Sovereign Council in Khartoum, signed a “Declaration of Principles” agreement in Juba, which established a separation between religion and the Sudanese State as a precursor to negotiations on power-sharing and wealth-sharing.[5] At the time General Al-Hilu said that the government was notorious for dishonouring agreements, but he hoped that this time they would be sincere.[6] Just seven months later, however, in October 2021, General al-Burhan led a military coup that derailed Sudan’s fragile transition and froze progress on the Juba peace framework.[7]
Following the military coup of 25 October 2021, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan suspended several key provisions of Sudan’s transitional constitutional framework,[8] dissolving the Sovereign Council, removing key civilian leaders, and dismantling the 2019 Draft Constitutional Declaration,[9] which had provided the legal foundation for Sudan’s democratic transition.
As a result, the constitutional guarantees that had enshrined civil liberties — including religious freedom, freedom of expression, and protection against discrimination — are no longer enforced. Legal scholars and international observers have consistently warned that the suspension of this framework has jeopardised the fragile human rights progress made between 2019 and 2021.[10] In the resulting vacuum, violations of freedom of religion or belief have become increasingly common, with perpetrators — often linked to the former regime or armed groups — acting with impunity. [11]
On May 18, 2024, three prominent Sudanese leaders—Abdelaziz Al-Hilu of the SPLM-N, Abdalla Hamdok of the Tagaddum movement, and Abdel Wahid Al-Nur of the Sudan Liberation Movement—signed the Nairobi Declaration, a landmark document calling for a secular, democratic Sudan.[12] The declaration emphasized the separation of religion from the State, the protection of religious freedom, and the right to self-determination if these principles were not enshrined in the future constitution. It also advocated for a unified national army under civilian control, equitable distribution of power and resources, and an immediate ceasefire to allow humanitarian access amid the ongoing civil war. Kenyan President William Ruto endorsed the declaration, describing it as a comprehensive framework for peace and urging Sudanese stakeholders to rally behind it.[13]
While it did not end the war, the principles have since shaped the Nairobi Transitional Constitution signed in early 2025 by the RSF and SPLM-N, establishing a parallel government in opposition to the SAF-led administration in Khartoum.[14]
Incidents and developments
After the coup, notwithstanding widespread protests and international condemnation, the military authorities carried out numerous arbitrary detentions and took deliberate steps to reverse the democratic gains made under the transitional government. This included the appointment of figures closely affiliated with the former Islamist regime of President Omar al-Bashir to key positions in the civil service, government-owned media and the central bank, signalling a return to repressive governance practices and undermining hopes for a genuine democratic transition.[15]
In April 2023, conflict broke out after diplomatic talks broke down between General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and General Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagala who failed to reach an agreement as to how to transition to power. The two rival factions now warring are the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) under al-Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) under Hemedti. General al-Burhan is backed by Saudi Arabia, while most observers believe that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is supporting Hemedti, partly because of his access to gold, and partly as a means of holding back the Islamism embodied by the SAF.[16] Fighting between these groups has forced 14 million to flee their homes[17] and in August 2024, the Famine Review Committee of the UN officially confirmed a famine in the Darfur region of Sudan.[18]
Half of the population — 25 million — is acutely short of food and the country is also experiencing shortages of water, medicine and fuel. Displaced people have fled to South Sudan, Chad, Libya and Uganda, and especially to Egypt which in 2025 was hosting 1.5 million Sudanese refugees. The UN noted that Sudan had the world’s largest displacement crisis and that 90 percent of its 19 million children had no access to formal education.[19]
According to experts assigned by the United Nations Security Council, the RSF and its allied militias were responsible for the deaths of between 10,000 and 15,000 civilians in West Darfur between April and December 2023.[20] The SAF and RSF have both wreaked havoc on churches, mosques, hospitals and schools. The following is just a selection of incidents that occurred during the review period.
In the first two weeks after fighting broke out on 15 April 2023, 291 civilians including five humanitarian workers died and 1,699 were wounded during aerial bombings and ground attacks by both the RSF and SAF forces. Doctors were targeted when they went to the assistance of the wounded and were even hunted down and executed in their homes.[21]
In April 2023, mosques in Burri, El Manshiya, and El Azhari were damaged and two mosques in El Mohandisin and Ombadda were partly destroyed. RSF soldiers continued to raid religious sites and turned the Episcopal All Saints Cathedral into a military base. At the end of May, RSF soldiers raided the Mar Jirjis church in Omdurman where 40 people had gathered for prayer. The attackers shot at the people and demanded money and gold.[22]
On 12 May 2023, the RSF invaded El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, initially engaging in combat with non-Arab Massalit militias and eventually killing 280 people. This attack came after the town had faced extreme violence in the preceding weeks which resulted in the deaths of around 2,000 people. Residents said that the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) were not present to protect them.[23]
On 13 May 2023, six unidentified gunmen in plain clothes attacked Mar Girgis Coptic Church in the Al-Masalma neighbourhood of Omdurman. They shot four men, including the priest, who was left with multiple fractures. The men then stabbed the church guard before looting the building. The attackers called those inside the church “sons of dogs and infidels” and forced them to convert to Islam.[24] The SAF and the RSF each blamed the other for the attack.[25]
On 14 May 2023, the RSF forcibly removed the Bishop of Khartoum from the Virgin Mary’s Coptic Orthodox Church so that it could be used as a military base. The following day, RSF soldiers broke into a Coptic church complex in Bahri, north of Khartoum and shot five members of the clergy.[26]
In November 2023, heavy shelling from the SAF destroyed the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church building in Omdurman, which lies across the River Nile from Khartoum.[27] In the same month, the Mariam Home, a Comboni Catholic missionary facility, was shelled injuring five nuns and several children.[28]
On 16 December 2023, the RSF attacked a Coptic Monastery in Wad Madani, the capital of Gezira state. Since then, five priests, five novices, and four labourers have been missing.[29] In an attempt to show that the monks were well treated, the RSF released a video showing a commander hugging them and giving them money.[30] Following the capture of Wad Madani by the SAF in January 2025, there have been severe human rights violations recorded including ethnically targeted attacks against the Kanabi community, resulting in the deaths of dozens of people and involving cases of torture and degrading treatment of women.[31] Further reports indicate that the violence in Wad Madani was spurred on by extremist Islamic preachers who urged the SAF to leave “no captives alive”.[32]
Before the coup, Catholics formed five percent of the population of Sudan, and there was a seminary in Khartoum. The war between the generals forced the Catholic Church to close parishes, schools and hospitals, and also some seminaries, which caused the transfer of some seminarians to other cities.[33]
In May 2024, in contrast, 57 students in Heiban, in the Nuba Mountains, were able to graduate from the Theological United Institute founded by the Lebanese pastor Sami Dagher who was a keynote speaker at the 2017 World Summit for Persecuted Christians in Washington.
The Nuba Mountains are controlled by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement North (SPLM-N) and the region has enjoyed almost unbroken harmony between its Muslim and Christian populations. It has remained one of the few places in the country where Christians are relatively safe from both government forces and the RSF alike.[34]
The Mother of Mercy Hospital, also in the Nuba Mountains, founded and led by the American Catholic missionary Dr. Tom Catena, has continued to treat hundreds of patients every day, among them some of the one million displaced people who have been accepted by the SPLM-N into the region. In March 2025, the Catholic hospital had 19 students preparing to be clinical officers and 29 students training for a diploma in midwifery.[35]
In December 2024, Catholic Bishop Yunan Tombe Trille, accompanied by a deacon, was assaulted by the RSF in El Obeid. He was beaten on his forehead, face and both sides of his face. He was unable to eat for days. Earlier in April 2023, the bishop narrowly escaped death when rockets hit his premises at the Mary Queen of Africa Cathedral.[36]
Since the fighting broke out in April 2023, it is estimated that by early 2025 over 165 churches have closed while others have been destroyed by shelling or razed to the ground.[37]
In September 2024, Sudan’s last civilian prime minister, Abdalla Hamdok, said that the country was fast becoming a “fertile ground” for the spread of regional terrorism at a time when several countries in Africa were struggling to contain jihadists.[38] Since Generals al-Burhan and Hemeti went to war in 2023, 150,000 have been killed and millions displaced from their homes.[39]
In October 2024, the SAF arrested 26 men fleeing from the town of Shendi in the River Nile State. Most of the men were Christian and were suspected of supporting the RSF. Some of the men were released but 12 were detained; most were members of the Sudanese Church of Christ in Al Ezba, and had been forced to flee with their families.[40] Some of the men detained were pressured into converting from Christianity to Islam.[41] In another incident, Christians living in a suburb of Wad Madani reported being forced to convert by the RSF, which controlled the area at the time.[42]
In April 2025, the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement North (SPLM-N), led by the veteran statesman General Abdelaziz Al-Hilu, formed a surprise alliance with the RSF. General Al-Hilu has always resisted seceding from Sudan, preferring instead to keep open negotiations with successive governments in Khartoum in the hope of securing a constitution in which religious freedom would be respected. The new agreement with the RSF secured for the SPLM-N the positions of Prime Minister and Defence Minister in a planned parallel government.[43]
Prospects for freedom of religion
Conflict, violence, and mass displacement have been a part of life for people in Sudan since the Darfur crisis in 2003. Yet the violence since the breakdown of diplomatic discussions in April 2023 has led to some of the worst brutality the country has seen, perpetrated by both the SAF and RSF on innocent civilians. In addition, the indiscriminate or deliberate destruction of religious sites and places of worship has worsened the situation for Christians and Muslims alike. Reports of targeted violence against Christians, including the murders of priests have increased their vulnerability in a profoundly unstable situation. With little hope for peace and continuing violence, the prospects for religious freedom remain very negative.
Sources
Sudan