DARFUR, Sudan — The jagged peaks of the Jebel Marra mountains rise suddenly out of an endless stretch of desert in western Sudan’s Darfur region. Rebel soldiers, many of whom came here to fight against the government nearly 20 years ago, man their posts.
Today civilians here live in relative safety after decades of war, but these mountaintop villages are completely cut off from the rest of Sudanese society. To many, trauma from decades of bombs dropped on them by their own government is compounded by their total isolation.
A team from VICE News are the first outside journalists to access the last rebel stronghold in Jebel Marra in five years. What we found is an area still completely cut off from Sudan and still functionally at war. Nearly a year after a historic revolution toppled President Omar al-Bashir, some in Jebel Marra haven’t even heard he is no longer in power.