On December 20, 2018, a protest was held at a market located in Al Qadarif. Members of the NISS dressed in civilian clothing were deployed to disperse the protest, including snipers positioned on top of the surrounding buildings.

At around 10 a.m., Muhanad Abdulgadir was passing by the protest while on his way home after a visit to Al Jazeera Bank, when he was arbitrarily executed by being shot in the head. Witnesses reported that, on the same day between 10 a.m. and 12 p.m., eight other people were killed at the protest by being shot in the head by two members of the NISS.

On January 17, 2019, Ibrahim Almanna participated in a peaceful demonstration near the presidential palace in Al Souq Al Arabi neighbourhood in Khartoum.

The National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) and the RSF deployed in the area started to disperse the protest by firing tear gas. Almanna was hit in the back of his head by a tear gas canister fired by the RSF. Almanna sustained a severe head injury as a result of which he was hospitalised at Al Baraha hospital on January 19, 2019.

On January 30, 2019 at around 3 p.m., members of the NISS dressed in civilian clothes arrested human rights activist and lawyer KamalEldin Awad Elgzoli Dyab at the office of his law firm in Khartoum without showing any warrant. Following the arrest, Dyab was taken to an unknown location.

On January 16, 2019 at around 5 p.m., human rights defender and political activist Rudwan Dawod failed to show up to a meeting at Al Souq Al Arabi in Khartoum.

On the morning of January 5, 2019, 12 armed men dressed in civilian clothes raided Yasir Ahmed’s family home in Omdurman, Sudan, where he had been staying temporarily after being discharged from hospital.

The officers – members of the NISS – informed Ahmed’s relatives that they had a search warrant, but refused to present it to them, and instructed the family not to speak up or film the arrest. The officers forced Ahmed into a vehicle, and brought him to an unknown location.

After Al Tigani wrote an article about the crimes of genocide committed in the Marrah Mountains region of Darfur for a foreign Arab newspaper in June 2018, the Sudanese embassy present in the country pressured the newspaper not to publish any more of her articles.

Since December 2016, Shabouna has been banned from working as a journalist in Sudan by the NISS. The NISS threatened the newspaper Shabouna worked for with the confiscation of their issues should they publish any article he has written.

Shabouna has been summoned repeatedly by the NISS since 2000 and has been prevented from working for several newspapers for periods ranging from six months to two years.

On November 26, 2016, while working as commentator on a sports programme on radio channel FM 104, Ahmed Gouda spoke about the protests ongoing in the country at the time over rising medicine prices. Later that day, Gouda was arrested by the NISS, and detained for more than 40 days. After his release, the NISS issued a one-year travel ban against him and ‘blacklisted’ him to ban him from working as a journalist in Sudan.

On May 5 and June 7, 2018, Younis was summoned by the NISS and questioned about two articles he had written for Sharq Al Awsat. These articles focused on the political divisions within the ruling party in Sudan, and on the confiscation of a newspaper issue by the NISS that reported on the consequences of the economic crisis on the lives of the people of Sudan. On both occasions, he was released after two hours of interrogation.

In 2011, Boshi was arrested and detained by the NISS for several weeks after having publicly criticised an adviser of the president of Sudan. He was also arrested and detained for more than a month in 2013 during the nationwide crackdown by the authorities on demonstrations. In both occasions, he was subjected to ill-treatment and held in inhumane conditions of detention. Following such abuses, in 2017 Boshi moved to Cairo to seek asylum with the UNHCR.