For Sudanese women who survived the war and sought refuge in Uganda, the violence did not end at the border. The abuse they fled has followed some of them into refugee settlements, workplaces, and even their homes.

This investigation reveals how former armed men continue to reproduce the legacy of war in the lives of Sudanese refugee women, amid fear, silence, and weak protection and accountability mechanisms. The reporting team interviewed 19 survivors and victims of assaults allegedly committed by Sudanese armed men in Uganda. Only five of the survivors reported the attacks, while the rest remained silent.

Sukaina’s Story

Sukaina, a 35-year-old folk singer, fled the horrors of war in Sudan with her six children in December 2024, leaving behind her husband, who remained in Sudan fighting on the front lines with the Sudanese Armed Forces.

After the army regained control of Khartoum, her husband visited her in Kampala, Uganda’s capital. According to Sukaina, he was no longer the man she had known.

“He would yell at the children and me, and sometimes threaten to kill me. He also threatened my daughters several times and forbade me from singing,” she said.

Sukaina recalls that her husband became increasingly violent and harsh. He tried to impose strict military-style discipline on the family and exert control over both her life and those of her daughters.

“The problems usually started when one of my daughters came home late from her institute,” she said.

According to one of Sukaina’s daughters, a young woman in her early twenties, her former military stepfather would sometimes threaten her and her sisters with violence and, at other times, with death. He closely monitored their behavior, viewing their movements outside the home as a violation of “Sudanese customs and traditions,” she said.

The pressure eventually led the young woman to file a complaint against him. However, neighbors intervened and pressured her to withdraw it. Two weeks after our interview with Sukaina and her family, neighbors informed us that she had fled with her children and moved to an undisclosed location.

A similar story is told by sisters Salima and Karima, who were forced to relocate within the Kiryandongo refugee settlement after reporting an assault allegedly carried out by their neighbor, a former member of the Rapid Support Forces.

“Our neighbor accused us of having relationships with men,” Karima said. “He attacked my sister, and when I came after hearing her cries for help, he attacked me as well, causing a deep wound to my head.”

The sisters reported the incident to the police, but they say the neighbor’s friends then began targeting them. “We called the police again, and they were arrested and detained,” Salima said. “But they were later released after the perpetrator himself was arrested.”

She added, “They continued to attack us every night. We asked the police for protection, and we were transferred to the reception center, a facility that receives newly arrived refugees.”

In the Kiryandongo refugee settlement, we interviewed thirteen Sudanese women who said they had experienced various forms of violence at the hands of men who had previously fought with different armed factions in Sudan. Three of them sought protection from the settlement’s police and at the United Nations facilities.

Uganda’s Ministry of Gender, Labor and Social Development ranked Kiryandongo as the district with the highest rate of gender-based violence nationwide in its latest 2025–2026 statistics. The ministry reported nearly 3,000 cases of gender-based violence in the district within a single year. Settlement police said they record between three and four cases of violence each day.

According to various 2025 reports by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), psychological and emotional abuse accounts for approximately 37 percent of reported cases in the settlement, while physical assault represents 22 percent. Rape and sexual violence make up 21 percent of reported incidents. The reports note that many of these cases occurred either during flight from Sudan or within Kiryandongo itself, and that the number of unreported cases is believed to be significantly higher.

Violence by Former Combatants Follows Refugee Women

The abuses committed by former combatants extend beyond domestic violence, neighborhood disputes, and the confines of refugee settlements. They affect refugee women in a wide range of settings.

A Sudanese woman who manages a café near a well-known small hotel in Kampala, and who asked not to be named, said: “The women who work with me, both Sudanese and Ugandan, are often subjected to verbal abuse when orders are delayed. The perpetrators are former Sudanese fighters, and we know who they are.”

The manager said she herself had received direct threats on several occasions from three different armed men because, in their view, “the café staff were not serving them well enough.”

At the same café, Sirin, a well-known Sudanese singer, recounted her experience of verbal sexual harassment.

“I came to Kampala last year to perform for Sudanese audiences, but that didn’t work out,” she said. “Instead, I found work in a restaurant and café frequented mostly by Sudanese refugees. I noticed regular customers who said they were former recruits. They were constantly fighting and using abusive language.”

She added: “Many times they verbally abused me and called me degrading names, such as ‘whore.’ They treated me like a servant, while others assumed I would go anywhere with them in exchange for money.”

Unable to endure the daily abuse, Sirin left her job six months ago.

Amani, 25, faces a different reality. Although she runs her own business, she says she is forced to endure abuse from her husband.

Amani lives with her husband, a Rapid Support Forces officer, in an expensive apartment in one of Kampala’s upscale neighborhoods. He travels regularly between Uganda and Sudan.

“He opened a café and a hair salon in my name for me to manage,” Amani said. “But every time he returns to Kampala, he beats me because of his extreme jealousy. The last time, he smashed my phone because one of my customers called me. But I have no choice except to stay with him.”

She added: “If I leave him, I won’t be able to survive in a country like Uganda, especially since I support my family in Sennar, Sudan, and he also sends them money.”

Uganda’s Domestic Violence Act of 2010 criminalizes all forms of domestic abuse. Victims are entitled to seek temporary or permanent protection orders that can remove perpetrators from the shared home or restrict their contact with and proximity to the victim. Domestic violence is punishable by up to two years in prison, a fine, or both.

Former Combatants as Refugees

Under Uganda’s Defense Forces Act, military personnel are tried before military courts, while civilians are prosecuted before civilian courts. Former Sudanese fighters who enter Uganda as refugees are treated as civilians and are therefore subject to the civilian justice system.

Although Uganda’s refugee registration process is open to all, both Ugandan and international law exclude active combatants from refugee status. Refugees undergo security screening at reception centers to identify any military background. When former combatants are identified, they should be directed to specialized mechanisms, such as amnesty commissions or rehabilitation programs, rather than housed in civilian refugee settlements, to safeguard the security of those communities.

However, Amnesty Commission offices are located only in major cities such as Kampala, Gulu, and Arua, and are not present in settlements such as Kiryandongo.

According to information published by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, if an individual’s military background is discovered during security screening at registration centers, they should be separated from civilian refugees and referred to specialized channels. The purpose is to ensure their disarmament before they are granted any legal status, as international refugee protection is not extended to individuals who continue to bear arms or engage in military activities.

The reporting team was unable to obtain reliable statistics on the number of Sudanese refugee women facing violence from former combatants who fled the conflict in Sudan and sought refuge in Uganda, nor on the number of refugees with military backgrounds.

Amna Al-Douma, manager of Cluster A, an area of the settlement that she says hosts a significant number of refugees with military backgrounds, told us that it is impossible to determine the exact number of former combatants living there.

“Many refugees deny having been fighters during their registration interviews at reception centers,” she said. “They are registered simply as civilians, which makes it difficult for the United Nations and refugee community leaders in the settlement to identify their previous affiliations.”

Silent Violence

Despite the strictness of Ugandan law in criminalizing all forms of violence, particularly gender-based violence, reports of abuse involving refugees rarely make their way into Ugandan courts, according to lawyer Abdulmuttalib Al-Khatim. Hatem Elias, one of the few Sudanese lawyers practicing in Uganda, says that refugees’ limited knowledge of Ugandan law contributes to the persistence of violence against women.

That was the case for Esther, 28, who was pregnant and living with her family in Khartoum after her husband had left the country. Members of the Rapid Support Forces allegedly tried to force her family to hand her over because of her appearance and beauty. Following a complex escape operation after she gave birth, assisted by a doctor, she eventually reached Uganda. Yet the fear never left her.

Her sister, Zahraa, recalled: “Esther escaped falling into the hands of armed men, but she was left partially paralyzed. The violence did not end there. During our first months in Uganda, we received threatening messages from people claiming to be in Kampala and affiliated with the Rapid Support Forces. They said they knew my sister was there.”

She added: “The family was forced to move repeatedly until Esther eventually relocated to another country.”

Amira, a woman in her thirties and a mother of five who earns a living selling second-hand clothing, faces a different reality. Her husband previously served with the Sudanese army. She now lives in a refugee settlement and says she is subjected to abuse by him. She has never filed a complaint and is unsure whether the authorities can protect her or provide support for her and her family.

Field reports by the Ayin Network indicate that women in the settlements face severe challenges, including inadequate healthcare, widespread malnutrition among mothers and pregnant women, and cases of abuse and violence linked to weak security protections within the camps.

Lawyer Hatem Elias believes many refugee women “are unaware of their legal rights and arrive carrying a social and cultural legacy shaped by traditional environments, as in the Sudanese context, where women are assigned subordinate roles and domestic violence is often viewed as a private matter that does not warrant legal intervention.”

From another perspective, transitional justice expert Al-Kashif Hussein Abbas argues that memories of violence and the psychological trauma associated with displacement, combined with poverty, economic dependence, separation from family, and the challenges of adapting to an unfamiliar environment, all contribute to silence and discourage reporting.

Abbas added that gender-based violence linked to armed conflict does not end when the fighting stops or when victims leave conflict zones. In many cases, it follows affected communities and families long after displacement. Conflicts leave behind patterns of coercion and violence that can be reproduced in refugee and displacement settings, particularly amid psychological trauma, social fragmentation, and the loss of protection mechanisms.

He also noted that community silence, the stigma surrounding sexual violence, and tribal and social pressures that discourage reporting help conceal the true scale of the problem and contribute to its repetition. According to Abbas, covering up crimes and allowing perpetrators to escape accountability not only denies justice to victims but also enables the effects of war to seep into everyday family life.

Addressing the problem, he said, requires breaking the silence, strengthening protection and accountability mechanisms, and enabling victims and witnesses to testify in safe environments to prevent the legacy of war from becoming a permanent threat to the lives of women and girls.

A report by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) echoes Elias’s observations in its comparison of Sudanese and Ugandan social norms. The report notes that gender-based violence is often surrounded by a “culture of silence” and that practices such as domestic abuse, forced marriage, and restrictions on women’s movement are frequently normalized rather than recognized as forms of violence. Disputes between spouses or neighbors are often referred to male family elders or tribal leaders for resolution.

Nahed Jabrallah, director of the SEEMA Center, links the rise in abuses to the absence of accountability.

“The lack of deterrence and accountability for past crimes is one of the reasons they continue to be repeated today,” she said, noting that survivors face overlapping challenges, including social stigma, fear, intimidation, and insecurity.

Jabrallah stressed that the true scale of the violations is far greater than documented cases suggest. “Sexual violence is among the crimes most likely to remain hidden, especially in conservative communities and displacement settings, where survivors face fear, stigma, and limited access to justice, psychological support, and healthcare services,” she said.

Left to Face Violence Alone

This culture of silence also affects the work of Sudanese refugee community leaders in the Kiryandongo settlement, who are often tasked with handling cases of violence. Hussein Ismail, the community’s protection officer, said their role is to protect vulnerable groups, including women and children.

“Sudanese customs, traditions, and religious interpretations contribute to the persistence of violence against refugee women,” he said. “Even though complaint boxes are available for women who do not feel safe revealing their identities, most cases of violence never reach us.”

The committee resolves disputes through joudiya, a traditional Sudanese mediation process in which community leaders or tribal elders intervene to settle conflicts. Cases that cannot be resolved in this way are referred to the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) police.

Psychologist Marwa Mohamed Ibrahim Ali said women who experience sexual or physical violence in contexts of conflict and displacement, particularly at the hands of individuals shaped by war or linked to military environments, often suffer from complex psychological and social trauma that extends far beyond the act of violence itself.

“Communities affected by conflict often treat abused women as though they must justify what happened to them, rather than recognizing them as victims of violence linked to war and conflict,” she said. “The absence of psychological and social support creates even more complex consequences for Sudanese refugee women in Kampala, many of whom are already living under the cumulative pressures of displacement, war, and the loss of security.”

Dr. Marwa believes early psychological intervention is essential in such cases. Individual therapy alone, she said, is often insufficient, particularly in communities that have experienced high levels of violence against women. Group psychosocial support programs help survivors regain a sense of safety and belonging and prevent trauma from developing into chronic crises that affect families and communities as a whole.

Several organizations in Kiryandongo provide response services for survivors. Health centers operated by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) offer emergency medical care and reproductive health services. The Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) handles legal reporting and security protection, while the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) provides psychosocial support and case management.

A number of local and international organizations also run psychosocial support programs for male refugees to help them cope with the trauma of war and displacement and reintegrate into society. These include TPO Uganda, the Whitaker Peace & Development Initiative (WPDI), the Refugee Law Project (RLP), the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), AVSI through its SMILES project, and the Uganda Red Cross.

However, Amna Al-Douma said that most of these organizations have focused on group counseling sessions rather than individual support. She added that the suspension of U.S. funding has limited the activities of some organizations.

The testimonies of the nineteen women interviewed for this investigation reveal a stark gap between the scale of the violence they experience and the number of cases that reach protection institutions. Of all the women who spoke to the reporting team, only five reported the abuse they endured. The others remained silent, held back by stigma, fear, economic dependence, and pressure from their families and communities.

For these women, crossing a border has not marked the end of the violence left behind by war. Power dynamics and coercive behaviors have traveled with them, moving from the battlefield into refugee settlements, workplaces, and homes. Amid gaps in registration and protection systems, limited awareness of legal rights, the prevalence of customary dispute resolution, and inadequate psychosocial support services, many women are left to confront their abusers alone.

Surviving a war zone does not necessarily mean escaping its logic. When refuge is not accompanied by effective legal and psychological protection, and when cycles of silence and impunity remain unbroken, war retains its ability to cross borders, settle inside homes, and reproduce itself in the lives of women and girls.