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Rooms “badly damaged” in Latest Bombing of Salesian Sisters’ House in Sudan

Sniper sparks a fire at the FMA house in Khartoum. Credit: Salesian Missions

By Magdalene Kahiu

El Obeid, 24 January, 2024 / 9:03 pm (ACI Africa).

The Dar Mariam House of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, (FMA/Salesian Sisters) in Sudan’s Catholic Archdiocese of Khartoum has been bombed for a second time after a sniper reportedly set fire to a section of the building. 

According to a Monday, January 22 report, a sniper from one of the rebel groups in the ongoing violent conflict between the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) set fire to the second floor of the house of the FMA members on January 2.

“Rooms and the hall on one side of the floor were badly damaged,” Salesian officials say in the report, adding that the fire was extinguished after two hours with help from neighbours.

In the report, Fr. Jacob Thelekkadan, a member of the Institute of Salesians of Don Bosco (SDB) says that nobody was injured during the attack.

“No one was injured. Thank God. May his will and his glory always prevail,” says Fr. Thelekkadan, a resident of the house that is also home to FMA members and lay people, including children, the elderly, and the sick, seeking refuge there. 

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The January 2 attack comes just over two months since the 3 November 2023 morning attack, when a bomb hit the FMA members’ house. No life was lost in the attack.

Fr. Thelekkadan told the Catholic Pontifical and Charity Foundation, Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) International, that the first part of the bomb which caused two explosions “shattered the teacher’s room, hurting him on both his legs, but not very seriously.”

“The second part of the bomb shattered the two rooms of the Sisters and their room doors flew off and fell a meter away,” said the Indian-born SDB member who serves as the Director of the Khartoum-based St. Joseph Vocational Training Centre (VCT).

The bomb also tore through the wall of a toilet and through the room of two other Sisters, Fr. Thelekkadan said about the last November attack.

The Priest said that casualties were minimized as the residents were gathered on the ground floor at the time of the attack.

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“We cannot imagine the harm that these explosions would have caused if it landed on the ground floor,” Fr. Thelekkadan said, adding, “Some residents suffered slight injuries. One young mother and her two children, aged seven and four, received minor head wounds.”

The UK-based human rights foundation, Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) condemned the attack “in the strongest terms.” 

CSW Founder President, Mervyn Thomas, called for “a full and comprehensive ceasefire” in Khartoum, and urged the international community to hold both warring parties accountable “for the violations and abuses they have committed against Sudanese citizens, both during this conflict and before it.”

Magdalene Kahiu

Magdalene Kahiu is a Kenyan journalist with passion in Church communication. She holds a Degree in Social Communications from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA). Currently, she works as a journalist for ACI Africa.

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