Sudan: Eyes of Nuba l Witness

Filmmakers: John Dickie and Will Sherman

Armed with a camera, Ahmed Khatir sets out to tell the story of a war that hardly anyone has heard of.

For Ahmed Khatir, when the war broke out in June 2011, he watched, powerless, as Sudanese soldiers burned his family's home.

But instead of taking up arms to join the rebels he decided to join a group of citizen journalists who are determined to make the world take notice as another African conflict unfolds.

This small band of self-taught journalists is based in the Nuba Mountains, on the border between Sudan and newly formed South Sudan. It is a place consumed by a conflict reminiscent of earlier regional wars.

Hoping his pictures will inspire action, Ahmed is now one of five Nuban reporters who roam the region recording the testimonies of those caught in the crossfire. They hope their work will bring the world's attention to this tragedy.

Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir and his government are waging a scorched earth campaign on their own people, terrorising all of Nuba because of the presence of the rebel Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) there.

Sudanese bombers randomly attack and burn villages, all in an effort to drive out the local population they suspect are in bed with the SPLA. Many now live in nearby caves, forced from their land and on the brink of starvation.

But this is a forgotten war. Few non-local journalists have ventured into Nuba, and little information comes out of there.

Ahmed and his team know that for the people living in Nuba, information and reaching out to the rest of the world may be their only hope of survival. Their aim is to prevent the region from descending further into genocide, to avoid becoming the next Darfur.

FILMMAKER'S VIEW

By John Dickie

At the start of the new century, the genocide in Sudan's Darfur and the atrocities committed there made headlines. Foreign governments and humanitarian organisations, prompted by global news reports filled with graphic images of death and mayhem, finally took action. Aid and outrage poured into the region and Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir subsequently became the first sitting head of state to be indicted by the International Criminal Court.

But the tragedy of genocide had not been confined to just this corner of Sudan. In the neighbouring province of Southern Kordofan, and particularly in the Nuba Mountains, a similar catastrophe is underway, yet nobody seems to know about it. How is this possible? This was one of the big questions that inspired us to begin this documentary film project.

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