General al-Burhan’s forces (SAF) and armed Islamists demolished the Pentecostal Church complex in Khartoum’s Haj Yousif district this week, wrecking its crosses, sanctuary and service buildings without warning or court order, church leaders and rights groups said.
Eyewitness videos show men in SAF uniforms alongside militiamen cheering as a bulldozer levelled the decades-old structure on 10 July. No official justification was provided, and local Christians said officers prevented them from rescuing furniture and Bibles before the demolition.
The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement – Revolutionary Democratic Current (SPLM-RDC) condemned the action as “a blatant violation of citizenship rights and religious diversity,” warning it would heighten sectarian tensions and fuel hatred in a country already fractured by civil war.
The General Union of Sudanese Christian Youth called for an emergency investigation, demanding the return of confiscated property and protection for believers in SAF-controlled zones. Its chair, Osama Saeed Musa Kodi, said the attack “directly targets the right to worship guaranteed under international law.”
Human-rights monitors note a pattern: churches in Khartoum and El Fasher have faced arson, SAF airstrikes or forced demolition in recent months, despite Port Sudan junta pledging to uphold freedom of religion.
Both SPLM-RDC and Christian youth leaders urged the UN and African Union to press Sudan’s warring factions to respect places of worship, arguing that true transitional justice “cannot begin while such abuses go unpunished.”
