While Mai's exact place of detention remains unknown, Badr was brought to North Kahrtoum NISS facility where he was reportedly tortured. Hence, Alkarama and ACS solicited several United Nations Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council to ask the Sudanese authorities to immediately release these students.

Alkarama and ACS already documented cases of human rights violations against students who peacefully demonstrated on different university campuses across Sudan in April 2016, including the arbitrary execution of Abubakr Hassan Taha on University of Kordofan's campus on 19 April 2016 by NISS officers. Alkarama was informed that many other students were arrested in late April and early May, including the two aforementioned ones.

Badr and Mai's arbitrary arrests at a Law firm

Badr and Mai took part in April's peaceful demonstrations in Khartoum University campus to protest against the alleged decision of the authorities to lease out some of the university's buildings for tourism purposes. Mai was actually arrested by NISS officers and detained for few days without charges following one of these protests. Furthermore, at the end of April and without any other reason than their involvement in these peaceful protests, Badr and Mai and many other students were notified that they had been excluded from their studies for a period of two years.

Determined to fight this unjust decision, the students met with a lawyer, Mr Nabil Adib, at his law firm on 5 May 2016. His office was however illegally raided during the meeting by plainclothes NISS officers carrying weapons. The officers did not show any arrest or search warrant. After having threatened and then beaten the firm's personnel and the students, they arrested everyone in the office and brought them to North Khartoum NISS facility, where the latter were reportedly tortured. To the exception of the law firm personnel, released few hours later without charges, all the students were kept in incommunicado detention.

Since the NISS is entitled under the National Security Act of 2010, to detain individuals for weeks without charges and judicial supervision, the students have not been released since and their families have been refused the right to visit them, despite having filed requests for this purpose. In fact, while it has been confirmed that Badr is detained incommunicado in North Khartoum facility, Mai's relatives were not informed of her official place of detention even if they had the confirmation that she is effectively detained by the NISS.

"We are particularly worried over the fates of Mai and Badr, especially since their relatives and lawyers have not been authorised to visit them for more than 15 days now," said Rachid Mesli, Alkarama's Legal Director. "There is a high risk that they could be facing torture again while in detention and it is of upmost importance that their families be allowed to visit them as soon as possible and that the students be released if no credible charges are brought against them."

Alkarama calls again upon the Sudanese authorities to uphold to their international obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which they ratified in 1986 and to release all the students arrested for peacefully demonstrating. Sudan should also size the opportunity of its recent Universal Periodic Review before the Human Rights Council (UPR) in May 2016 to amend the National Security Act of 2010. This law gives extraordinary arrest and detention powers to the NISS and grants its officers a form of immunity from prosecution for human rights violations committed on duty.

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