Sudan

Summary of Domestic Prohibition

Slavery and slave trade

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Practices similar to slavery

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Servitude

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Forced or compulsory labour

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Human trafficking

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Forced marriage

Provisions related to forced marriage in Sudan are found in the 2004 Penal Code, which addresses abduction for marriage at Article 307 with a potential penalty of imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years and a potential fine. The 2004 Penal code also addresses marriage by deception with at Article 425 with a potential penalty of imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years and a potential fine.

Consent to marriage

Provisions requiring consent to marriage in Sudan are found in the constitutional law 2005, section 15(1) of which states that the family is the natural and fundamental unit of the society and is entitled to the protection of the law; the right of man and woman to marry and to found a family shall be recognized, according to their respective family laws, and no marriage shall be entered into without the free and full consent of its parties.

Servile marriage

There appears to be no legislation in Sudan that prohibits servile matrimonial transactions.

Marriage trafficking

Although legislation in Sudan does not prohibit marriage trafficking as such, it does prohibit abduction for marriage under article 307 of the Penal Code 2003, with a potential penalty of with imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years and may also be liable to fine.

Minimum age for marriage

There appears to be no minimum age for marriage in Sudan. However, the marriage of a pubescent woman shall be concluded by the guardian with the permission and consent to the husband and the dowry, as set out on Article 34 of the 1991 Muslim Personal Act. In addition, marriages of females below the age of majority are permitted with the permission of a judge and after providing that the marriage benefit the minor girl and that the husband is suitable, as set out on Article 40 of the 1991 Muslim Personal Act.

Region

Africa

Regional Court

Not party to a court

Legal System

Mixed

International Instruments

1926 Slavery Convention
15 September 1927
1953 Protocol to the Slavery Convention
Not Party
1956 Supplementary Slavery Convention
09 September 1957
1966 ICCPR
18 March 1986
1930 Forced Labour Convention
18 June 1957
2014 Protocol to the 1930 Forced Labour Convention
17 March 2021
1957 Abolition of Forced Labour Convention
22 October 1970
1999 Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention
07 March 2003
2000 Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons
02 December 2014
1998 Rome Statute of the ICC
Not Party
1956 Supplementary Slavery Convention
09 September 1957
1966 ICCPR
18 March 1986
1966 Optional Protocol to the ICCPR
Not Party
1966 ICESCR
18 March 1986
2008 Optional Protocol to the ICESCR
Not Party
1962 Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum Age for Marriage and Registration of Marriages
Not Party
1957 Convention on the Nationality of Married Women
Not Party
1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child
03 August 1990
2000 Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography
02 November 2004
2011 Optional Protocol to the CRC on a communications procedure
Not Party
1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
Not Party
1999 Optional Protocol to CEDAW
Not Party
1978 Convention on the Celebration and Recognition of the Validity of Marriages
Not Party
2000 Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons
02 December 2014
1998 Rome Statute of the ICC
Not Party
1999 Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention
07 March 2003

International Obligations

  • Slavery
  • Servitude
  • Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery
  • Forced Labour
  • Human Trafficking
  • Marriage Trafficking

Regional Organisations

  • African Union
  • Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
  • Arab League

Legislative Provisions

AWAD REPORT

Paragraph 446

…there was no special legislation dealing with slavery except Act XI of the now repealed Agreement for the Administration of the Sudan 1899 which absolutely prohibited slavery, importation or exportation of slaves in the Sudan. Now the Transitional Constitution of the Republic of Sudan which is the supreme law of the country firmly safeguards the freedom and equality of the individual.

Paragraph 447

Relevant sections of our Penal Code make certain acts which tend to interfere with the freedom of the individual as offences as follows:

Section 313.  Whoever for money or money’s worth, transfers or purports to transfer the possession on control of any person to another with intent to enable such other persons to confine such person unlawfully or to compel him unlawfully to labour against his will, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to seven years and shall also be liable to fine.

Section 311. Whoever unlawfully compels any person to labour against the will of that person, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year or with fine or with both.

Since these acts constitute criminal offences under our Penal Code attempts to commit such offences or the abetment of such offences constitutes also offences punishable under the Penal Code.

 

CONSTITUTION OF SUDAN 2005

15. Family, women and marriage

  1. The family is the natural and fundamental unit of the society and is entitled to the protection of the law; the right of man and woman to marry and to found a family shall be recognized, according to their respective family laws, and no marriage shall be entered into without the free and full consent of its parties.

28. Life and human dignity

Every human being has the inherent right to life, dignity and the integrity of his person, which shall be protected by law; no one shall arbitrarily be deprived of his life.

  1. Personal liberty

Every person has the right to liberty and security of person; no person shall be subjected to arrest, detention, deprivation or restriction of his liberty except for reasons and in accordance with procedures prescribed by law.

30. Sanctity from Slavery and Forced Labour

  1. Slavery and slave trade in every form is prohibited. No person shall be held in slavery or servitude.

2. No person shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour except as a penalty upon conviction by a court of law.

42. Freedom of movement and residence

  1. Every citizen shall have the right to freedom of movement and the liberty to choose his residence except for reasons of public health and safety as shall be regulated by law.

2. Every citizen shall have the right to leave the country and return thereto as shall be regulated by law.

Constitution of Sudan 2005 (PDF)

 

PENAL CODE 2003

Section 286 – “Wrongful Confinement Defined”

Whoever restrains any person in such a manner as to prevent that person from proceeding beyond certain circumscribing limits, is sad to confine that person wrongfully.

Illustrations – (a) (“A”) causes (“Z”) to go within a walled space and locks (“Z”) in, (“Z”) is thus prevented from proceeding in any direction beyond the circumscribing line of wall. (“A”) wrongfully confines (“Z”). (b) (“A”) places men with firearms at outlets of a building and tells (“Z”) that they will fire at (“Z”) if (“Z”) attempts to leave the building, (“A”) wrongfully confines (“Z”). Section 287- “Wrongful Restraint”: Whoever wrongfully restrains any person, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding one month or with fine or with both.

Section 288 – “Wrongful Confinement”

Whoever wrongfully confines any person, commits an offence and shall on conviction be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year or with fine or with both. And if the wrongful confinement continues for three days or more, with imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or with fine or with both. Section 310 – “Buying or Selling or other Disposal of Persons”: Whoever buys, sells, hires, lets to hire or otherwise obtains possession or disposes of any person with the intent that such person shall be employed or used for any unlawful or immoral purpose or knowing it to be likely that such person will be employed or used for any such purpose, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years and may also be liable to fine and forfeiture of properties.

Section 307 – “Kidnapping or Abducting Woman to Compel her Marriage, etc.”

Whoever kidnaps or abducts any woman with intent that she may be compelled or knowing it to be likely that she will be compelled to marry any person against her will or in order that she may be forced or seduced to illicit intercourse or knowing it to be likely that she will be forced or seduced to illicit intercourse, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years and may also be liable to fine.

Section 310 – “Buying or Selling or other Disposal of Persons”

Whoever buys, sells, hires, lets to hire or otherwise obtains possession or disposes of any person with the intent that such person shall be employed or used for any unlawful or immoral purpose or knowing it to be likely that such person will be employed or used for any such purpose, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years and may also be liable to fine and forfeiture of properties.

Section 311 “Unlawful Compulsory Labour”

Whoever unlawfully compels any person to labour against the will of that person, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or with fine or with both.

Section 312 – “Kidnapping or Abducting in Order to Subject to Unlawful Compulsory Labour”

Whoever kidnaps or abducts any person with intent that such person may be unlawfully compelled to labour against his will commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding seven years and may also be liable to fine.

Section 313 – “Transferring Control of Person with Intent to Subject him to Unlawful Confinement or Unlawful Compulsory Labour”

Whoever for money or money’s worth, transfers or purports to transfer the possession or control of any person to another with intent to enable such other person to confine such person unlawfully or to compel him unlawfully to labour against his will, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding seven years and may also be liable to fine.

Section 315 – “Transferring outside the New Sudan the Possession of Person obtained within the New Sudan”

Whoever being in possession or control of any person within the New Sudan, conveys such person outside the New Sudan and thereby transfers or purports to transfer the possession or control of such person in any manner which would constitute an offence if such transfer or purported transfer took place within the New Sudan, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished in the same manner as if such transfer or purported transfer had taken place within the New Sudan.

Section 315(A) – “Trafficking in Persons for Immoral Purposes to be Carried Outside the New Sudan”

Whoever procures, entices or leads away, even with his consent, any person for immoral purposes to be carried outside the New Sudan, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding seven years and may also be liable to fine.

Penal Code 2003 (PDF)

LABOUR CODE 1997
  1. Conditions of employment of young persons

(1) It shall be forbidden to employ young persons in any of the following jobs:

(a) carrying heavy loads;

(b) work involving the use of metal presses;

(c) work related to iron and steel smelting;

(d) work performed under ground or under water, and mining and quarrying work;

(e) work involving the use of lead or lead compounds;

(f) jobs in which workers are exposed to organic or inorganic poisonous or harmful material such as lead, mercury, calcium, benzine and its derivatives;

(g) jobs involving x-rays and other harmful radiation;

(h) jobs involving the maintenance of machinery and conveyer belts.

(2) Without any prejudice to the provisions of sub-paragraph (1) it shall be forbidden, as a rule, to employ a young person in hazardous or unhealthy industries and jobs or in jobs requiring large physical effort or in jobs or occupations which are harmful to their morals. Such jobs and industries shall be specified by order of the Minister or his delegate.

(3) It shall be forbidden to employ a young person between 8.p.m. and 6.a.m. The competent authority may, however, exclude any category of young persons from this provision in cases of young persons between the age of 15 and 16 years.

(4) It shall be forbidden to employ young persons under the age of 12 years, except in:

(a) the State’s training schools;

(b) non-profitable training workshops;

(c) jobs supervised by his family members in establishments which do not employ other persons;

(e) jobs performed under apprenticeship contracts.

  1. The prohibition of applying certain contracts

Any contract of employment under which a worker undertakes to concede to his employer all or part of the sums due to him under the contract of employment shall be deemed null and void. It shall be prohibited for the courts to order the application of such contract.

Labour Code 1997 (PDF)

COMBATING OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING ACT 2014

Article 2:

In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires –

“Human Trafficking” means any of the acts, which constitutes an offence under the provisions of section 7, hereof,

Article 7:

(1 ) There shall be deemed to have committed the offence of in human trafficking, whoever kidnaps, transfers, abducts, transports, harbors, receives, detains or equips a natural person, with intent to exploit or use the same in unlawful business, or any acts, as may by nature degrade his dignity, or achieve unlawful aims in consideration of any of the following:

(a) material return, or promise therewith;

(b) moral gam, or promise therewith;

(c) granting any type of advantages.

(2) The acts mentioned in sub-section (1), shall be deemed human trafficking, where they have been accomplished by the use of force, or threat of use of force, or by any of the forms of coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, or abuse of power and influence, or exploitation of a state of weakness or need, or by granting payments or advantages, or promise therewith, in order to obtain the consent of a person to traffic in another person upon whom he has control.

Article 8:

The offence of human trafficking shall be deemed transnational where it is committed in:

(a) more than one State;

(b) one State and the arrangement, perpetration, planning, supervision, or financing the same has been done in or by another State;

(c) any State, through an organized criminal group, practicing criminal activities in more than one State;

(d) one State, and the effects thereof have extended to another State

Article 9:

(1 ) Whoever commits the offence of human trafficking shall be punished, with imprisonment, for a term, which is not less than three years, and not exceeding ten years.

(2) Whoever commits the offence of human trafficking shall be punished, with imprisonment, for a term which is not less than five years, and not exceeding twenty years, or with death, where:

(a) he has established, founded, organized or managed an organized criminal group, assumed leadership thereof, or called for joining the same;

(b) the victim is female or a child who has not attained eighteen years of age, or is disabled;

(c) the offence has been committed through cheating, use of force or threat of causing death or bodily or psychological torture;

(d) the act has been done by two or more persons, or by a person carrying a weapon;

(e) the offender is the victim’s spouse or one of his ascendants, descendants, guardian or having control over him;

(f) the offence is of trans-national character;

(g) any one of the victims has been subjected to sexual abuse, removal of organs, or used in prostitution, or any act. as may by its nature degrades human dignity;

(h) the person, who has committed the offence of human trafficking is a public servant, or assigned with performing a public service, and the offence has been committed by abuse of the office or position thereof;

(i) the offence has resulted in the death of the victim, or his sustaining a permanent disability or an incurable disease.

Combating of Human Trafficking Act 2014 (PDF)

CYBERCRIME ACT 2007
  1. Trafficking in human beings

Any person who creates or publishes a site on an information network, computer hardware or similar for the purposes of trafficking in human beings or facilitating such a transaction shall be liable to a prison sentence not exceeding ten years or a fine or both penalties.

Cybercrime Act 2007 (PDF)

CHILD ACT 2008

Note: prohibits but does not prescribe punishments for forced child labor, child prostitution, sex trafficking, and the recruitment of children under the age of 18 into armed forces or groups

SUDAN ARMED FORCES ACT 2007

Note: prohibits members of the armed forces from recruiting children younger than 18, enslaving civilians, or coercing civilians into prostitution

Sudan Armed Forces Act 2007 (PDF)

CONSTITUTION OF SUDAN 2005

15. Family, women and marriage

1. The family is the natural and fundamental unit of the society and is entitled to the protection of the law; the right of man and woman to marry and to found a family shall be recognized, according to their respective family laws, and no marriage shall be entered into without the free and full consent of its parties.

 

Sudan Constitution 2005 – Constitute Project – English (PDF)

PENAL CODE 2003       

CHAPTER 22. OFFENCES AFFECTING HUMAN BODY OFFENCES AFFECTING LIFE KIDNAPPING, ABDUCTION AND FORCED LABOUR

Section 307 – “Kidnapping or Abducting Woman to Compel her Marriage, etc.”

Whoever kidnaps or abducts any woman with intent that she may be compelled or knowing it to be likely that she will be compelled to marry any person against her will or in order that she may be forced or seduced to illicit intercourse or knowing it to be likely that she will be forced or seduced to illicit intercourse, commits an offence and shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding ten years and may also be liable to fine.

CHAPTER 25 OFFENCES RELATING TO MARRIAGE AND INCEST

Section 425 – “Cohabitation caused by a man deceitfully inducing a belief of lawful

Marriage”: Every man who by deceit causes any woman who is not lawfully married to him to believe that she is lawfully married to him and to cohabit or have sexual intercourse with him in that belief, shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years and may also be liable to fine.

Section 426 – “Marriage ceremony fraudulently gone through without lawful

Marriage”: Whoever dishonestly or with a fraudulent intention goes through the ceremony of being married knowing that he is not thereby lawfully married, shall on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years and may also be liable to fine.

 

Sudan Penal Code 2003 – English (PDF)

PERSONAL STATUS LAW 1991

24. Marriage of the guardian to the adult firstborn

(1) The marriage of a pubescent woman shall be concluded by her guardian with her permission and consent to the husband and the dowry. Her word regarding her attainment of pubescence shall be conclusive unless it contradicts the obvious.

(2) – The virgin must be accepted, explicitly or implicitly, if her guardian consents to her without her permission, then informs her of the contract.

40

(1) The marriage of a madman, an imbecile, or a discerning person is not believed except by his guardian after the emergence of a preponderant interest.

(2) – Discrimination shall be upon reaching the age of ten.

(3). The guardian of a minor girl cannot conclude her marriage contract unless there is permission from the judge. The guardian has to prove that the marriage will benefit the minor girl, that the husband is suitable and the husband pays the dowry usually paid to women of her status.