The United Nations says Sudan's warring parties appear headed for major clashes in the North Darfur city of El Fasher, where hundreds of thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) have sought refuge. The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are reportedly encircling El Fasher, suggesting that a coordinated move to attack the city may be imminent. At the same time, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) appear to be positioning themselves.
“We are receiving increasingly alarming reports of a dramatic escalation of tensions between armed actors in El Fasher, North Darfur,” the office of the spokesperson of UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement on Friday.
“An attack on the city would have devastating consequences for the civilian population. This escalation of tensions is in an area already on the brink of famine,” the statement continued.
The office statement also said the UN envoy to Sudan, Ramtane Lamamra, is working with the parties to de-escalate tensions in El Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur.
At least 43 people, including women and children, have reportedly been killed in fighting in the North Darfur town since April 14, when RSF, backed by its allied militias, began a push to take control of the town, the last remaining SAF stronghold in Sudan's Darfur region.
Since early April, the Rapid Support Forces have launched several large-scale attacks on the villages to the west of El-Fasher. As fighting between the SAF and RSF escalates in North Darfur, more than 36,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in El Fasher.
On Friday, a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights urged the warring parties to immediately stop the violence in and around El Fasher. Speaking from the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, Seif Magango of the UN human rights office warned that the battle for El Fasher, which has been raging outside the town for several weeks, could take a turn for the worse.
“Reports indicate that both parties have launched indiscriminate attacks using explosive weapons with wide-area effects, such as mortar shells and rockets fired from fighter jets, in residential districts,” the spokesman said.
“Since early April, the RSF has conducted several large-scale attacks on the villages in western El Fasher mostly inhabited by the African Zaghawa ethnic community,” he said, noting that several Zaghawa villages, including Durma, Umoshosh, Sarafaya, and Ozbani had been burned down.
“Such attacks raise the specter of further ethnically motivated violence in Darfur, including mass killings,” he said.
Over the past year, RSF attacks on African Masalit communities in West Darfur have left thousands of civilians dead or injured and tens of thousands displaced from their homes. Between April and June last year, up to 15,000 people - mostly men - were reportedly killed in ethnically-motivated mass atrocities in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state alone.
The earlier Darfur conflict, which erupted in 2003 between Arab and non-Arab communities, killed at least 200,000 people and left a deadly legacy of landmines and explosive remnants of war that continue to devastate communities long after the war ended.
The region then experienced large-scale ethnic violence, mass killings, crimes against humanity and genocide as Arab Janjaweed militias targeted Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa communities. The RSF grew out of the Janjaweed militias, which historically fought on behalf of the Sudanese government.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has supplied arms to the Rapid Support Forces in the past and, according to media reports and UN-appointed experts, continues to do so. There are credible allegations against the country on the Arabian Peninsula of shipping arms and ammunition to the RSF in Darfur through neighboring Chad.
The UAE has denied any involvement in supplying arms and ammunition to the RSF through Chad.
On Friday, the chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, unequivocally condemned external interference and reiterated the AU's call for foreign countries “to cease immediately, the supply of weapons to the belligerents in clear violation of legally binding UN Security Council sanctions.”
On Saturday, members of the UN Security Council called on the warring parties in Sudan to immediately cease military build-up and take steps to de-escalate the situation in El Fasher. In a statement, Council members urged all states to refrain from external interference aimed at fueling conflict and instability and instead support efforts to achieve a lasting peace, while reminding all parties to the conflict and member states to comply with the arms embargo measures.
The war between rival factions of the Sudanese military, which broke out in April last year, has left more than 18 million people facing hunger and nearly 9 million uprooted from their homes. The Rapid Support Forces have been fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces for the past year.
The war began on April 15 in the capital, Khartoum, and has since spread to other parts of the country. The two generals leading the warring parties were once allies in Sudan's transitional government following a coup in 2021, but have become rivals for power.
OHCHR spokesman Magango said civilians trapped in El Fasher fear they will be killed if they try to flee the town.
“This dire situation is compounded by a severe shortage of essential supplies as deliveries of commercial goods and humanitarian aid have been heavily constrained by the fighting, and delivery trucks are unable to freely transit through RSF-controlled territory,” he said.
El Fasher is a well-established humanitarian hub. Fighting there would make it even more dangerous and difficult to store and deliver aid.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, urges both parties to the conflict and their allies to allow civilians safe passage to other areas and to allow humanitarian assistance to reach civilians in dire need safely and unimpeded.
Türk also calls for an immediate de-escalation of this catastrophic situation and an end to the conflict that has ravaged the country for more than a year. He also calls for an investigation into all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights and humanitarian law.
For his part, UN Secretary-General António Guterres, through his spokesperson, reiterated his call on all warring parties "to refrain from fighting in the El Fasher area," warning of devastating consequences for the civilian population "in an area already on the brink of famine."
Earlier in the week, the United States had also called on all armed forces in Sudan to immediately cease their attacks in El Fasher.
“We are alarmed by indications of an imminent offensive by the Rapid Support Forces and its affiliated militias. An offensive against El Fasher city would subject civilians to extreme danger, including the hundreds of thousands of displaced persons who have taken refuge there,” said Matthew Miller, spokesperson for the US Department of State.
“The leaders of the SAF and RSF and their affiliated militias face a choice – escalate the violence and perpetuate the suffering of their people while risking the disintegration of their country, or cease attacks, allow unhindered humanitarian access, and prepare in good faith for negotiations to end this war and restore power to the people of Sudan,” he added.
Sudan is experiencing a humanitarian emergency of epic proportions that many have called the world's largest human-made crisis, with half the population in need of life-saving assistance, tens of thousands killed and injured, and millions uprooted from their homes.
Aid agencies say the war is having catastrophic consequences for a population of nearly 49 million people - more than 24.8 million are in need of life-saving humanitarian aid. Among those in need are more than 14 million children. In the Darfur region, more than 9 million people depend on humanitarian assistance.
Widespread reports of sexual violence underscore the disproportionate impact of the war on women and girls. Allegations of rape, sexual slavery, forced marriage and trafficking of women and girls continue to be reported, particularly in Khartoum, Darfur and Kordofan. Millions of civilians are particularly vulnerable as they flee conflict zones.
Since April last year, more than 8.9 million people have been displaced - some 6.9 million within Sudan and 2 million as refugees in neighboring countries. According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), 20,000 people, half of them children, are forced to flee their homes every day in Sudan.
In total, an estimated 12 million people are now displaced by conflict in Sudan, including more than 9.5 million within the country, making Sudan the largest internal displacement crisis in the world and one of the two largest displacement crises in the world, alongside the Syrian war.
Sudan could soon become the world's worst hunger crisis, with nearly 18 million people suffering from acute hunger, including 5 million on the brink of famine. Famine is expected to hit the country by 2024, particularly in the Darfur and Kordofan regions and in Khartoum and Al-Jazira states.
Some information for this report provided by VOA.
Further information
Full text: Note to Correspondents: On Sudan - the situation in El Fasher, UN Secretary-General, released April 26, 2024
https://www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/note-correspondents/2024-04-26/note-correspondents-sudan-the-situation-el-fasher
Full text: Sudan: Türk expresses grave concern at escalating violence in El-Fasher, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, press briefing notes, released April 26, 2024
https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-briefing-notes/2024/04/sudan-turk-expresses-grave-concern-escalating-violence-el-fasher
Full text: Chairperson of the Commission Expresses Alarm at The Deteriorating Security and Humanitarian Situation in North Darfur, Sudan, African Union, statement, released April 26, 2024
https://au.int/en/pressreleases/20240426/statement-chairperson-situation-north-darfur-sudan
Full text: The United States Calls for an Immediate Cessation of Attacks in El Fasher, North Darfur, Sudan, United States Department of State, statement, published April 24, 2024
https://www.state.gov/the-united-states-calls-for-an-immediate-cessation-of-attacks-in-el-fasher-north-darfur-sudan-2/