On the Official Launch of PEN Sudan

On September 30, 2026, PEN Sudan was formally admitted to PEN International during the 92nd PEN International Congress.

This milestone reflects nearly two years of collective effort by Sudanese writers, including founding members Sara Aljack, Ishraga Mustafa Hamid, Mansour El Souwaim, and Alsaddiq Alraddi.

ArabLit contributor Lemya Shammat said, of this milestone:

As a member of the Sudanese Writers’ Union, I am deeply aware of the heavy price writers have paid for telling the truth, raising awareness, and contributing to a culture of enlightenment. They have been followed, searched, humiliated, and repeatedly detained. Books have been censored and banned, works confiscated, events monitored or cancelled, and creative efforts obstructed. Writers and artists have learned to look over their shoulders as they write and create.

And now, amid this devastating genocidal war, libraries and archives have been destroyed, while museums and cultural centers have been looted, vandalized, and reduced to rubble. Writers and artists have been terrorized, uprooted, displaced, and left struggling to survive.

Against this backdrop, establishing PEN Sudan became an urgent necessity. It grew out of a need to create, against all odds, a safe and supportive space and a network for established and emerging writers, thinkers, and artists whose voices have too often been silenced or left without a platform. A space where they can be heard, find one another, exchange ideas, create, and come together in meaningful work.

For me, this is what makes PEN Sudan so important. It is about much more than becoming part of a respected international organization. It is about creating a home for Sudanese voices at a time when they most need to be protected, connected, and heard.

In its prepared statement, PEN Sudan organizers said that the organization “will work to uphold freedom of expression and support writers whose voices are vulnerable or at risk. It will create spaces for cultural and intellectual exchange, strengthen connections between Sudanese writers and their peers around the world, and give particular attention to voices that face marginalization, threats, exclusion, or barriers to expressing themselves freely.”

Also read: Silence as Expression, Symbol, and the Risks Facing Sudanese Writers and Filmmakers

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