Intelligence Community Honors DigitalGlobe with Award for Satellite Sentinel Project Collaboration

Earlier this week, at the 2012 GEOINT Symposium—the nation’s largest intelligence event—the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, or USGIF, honored DigitalGlobe and theSatellite Sentinel Project, or SSP, with the 2012 Industry Intelligence Achievement Award. This was part of the USGIF Awards Program that annually recognizes the exceptional work of the geospatial intelligence tradecraft’s brightest minds. The award winners are nominated by organizations within the field of geospatial intelligence, known as GEOINT.

Satellite Sentinel Project Solves Mystery of Sudan Cellphone Video

Few have ever heard of the Nuba Mountains village of Um Bartumbu, and fewer still have been there. It is located in the conflict-torn state of South Kordofan, Sudan, where troops fighting for the government of Sudan, and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army-North, or SPLM/A-N, have been fighting since June 2011. Um Bartumbu Village does not appear on most maps, but it hosts a clinic, a mosque, Sudanese Church of Christ, several storerooms, a communal grinding mill, and copses of desert date trees. But for new eyewitness reports obtained by citizen journalists, the recent discovery and release of a cellphone video, and new confirmation from DigitalGlobe and Landsat satellite imagery, the world would never know of the razing of the village and the forced flight of its inhabitants.

Bashir Regime Faces Growing Resistance as Protests Endure for Over a Week

With the 23rd anniversary of President Omar al-Bashir’s oppressive rule fast approaching, protests have swept through Sudan’s capital and neighboring cities. Yet this series of demonstrations “feels different” than previous anti-regime protests, report activists on the ground. Recent austerity measures and price increases have mobilized hundreds of Sudanese to take to the streets shouting, “The people want to bring down the regime!”—a chant that had resonated throughout the Arab world last spring.

Humanitarian Resources Stretched as Influx of Refugees from Blue Nile Arrive in South Sudan

JUBA, South Sudan -- Humanitarian aid groups working in South Sudan report that, in the last three weeks, over 35,000 refugees from the Sudanese state of Blue Nile have entered transit centers and over-stretched refugee camps in Upper Nile state. The first week of June alone saw an average of 4,000 people a day streaming across the North-South border into Upper Nile. This influx brings the total number of refugees in the South Sudanese state of Upper Nile to 105,000, a staggering number that exceeds the capacity of the state’s two existing refugee camps, Jammam and Doro.

One Year Later, Sudan Continues to Target Civilians in South Kordofan