Girls Raped By Uniformed Men In Darfur

Khartoum denies there has been any organised campaign of rape, while allowing that individual cases may have occurred.

Two girls aged 11 and 12 and three women were raped by men wearing military uniforms in Sudan's Darfur region, peacekeepers said on Wednesday.

The joint U.N./African Union UNAMID peacekeeping force said it would not release details of the date or place of the sex attacks because of high sensitivity over the issue.

But force spokesman Noureddine Mezni told Reuters the crimes had been "documented" over the past week.

Activists and western governments have accused government-backed militias and other armed groups of carrying out widespread rapes during the five-year conflict, which international experts say has killed more than 200,000 people.

Khartoum denies there has been any organised campaign of rape, while allowing that individual cases may have occurred.

The attack on the two girls was described as a "gang rape ... by three men described as armed and wearing military uniforms," according to a UNAMID statement.

Armed men also attacked and tried to rape two groups of women in West Darfur on Thursday and Saturday, U.N. sources reported. An elderly man accompanying one of the groups of women was shot dead by attackers, they added.

Campaigners say it is nearly impossible for raped women to prosecute their attackers in a region where Islamic law requires four male witnesses to substantiate any allegation of sexual attack.

Women who fail to prove their accusation risk prosecution themselves for admitting to having had sex outside marriage, said a report by U.S.-based Refugees International.

A 13-year-old girl who said she had been raped was accused of adultery and stoned to death in Somalia last week, the U.N. and Amnesty International reported.