UNITAMS made further concrete steps to broaden the scope of consultations process launched earlier this month, with emphasis on engaging groups in all states of Sudan. SRSG Volker Perthes led a full day of consultations sessions, on Monday, with several Darfur-based groups including Darfur Resistance Committees, Darfur Women’s Groups, Darfur IDP representatives and Mr. Gibril Ibrahim, head of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM).

Armed men have arrested prominent Sudanese women’s rights campaigner Amira Osman in a night-time raid on her home in Sudan’s capital Khartoum, her sister said. Osman’s arrest comes amid, what activists say, a campaign of arrests of civil society and pro-democracy figures since a military takeover in October.

The United Nations mission in Sudan said on Twitter it was outraged by Osman’s arrest, citing a “pattern of violence against women’s rights activists” that risked reducing their participation in politics.