A Sudanese military aircraft crashed while attempting to land in the east of the country and killed all the crew members on board in the latest plane crash in the war-torn African nation, military officials said.
The Ilyushin Il-76 cargo plane experienced technical failure while attempting to land Tuesday in the Osman Digna Air Base in the coastal city of Port Sudan, two officials said Wednesday.
The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to brief the media, did not disclose how many personnel were on board, The AP news reported.
Among the dead was military pilot Omran Mirghani, according to his uncle, prominent Sudanese journalist Osman Mirghani, who mourned his nephew's death on social media.
The military didn’t comment on the crash.
Plane crashes are not uncommon in Sudan, which has a poor aviation safety record. In February, at least 46 people, including women and children, were killed when a military aircraft crashed in a densely populated area in Omdurman, the sister city of the capital, Khartoum.
The crash came as the miliary has suffered multiple setbacks in its war against a notorious Rapid Support Forces. The miliary lost el-Fasher, its last stronghold in the sprawling region of Darfur in October, and earlier this week was forced to pull out from the country’s largest oil processing facility in the central region of Kordofan.
The RSF has been accused of committing atrocities in el-Fasher including summary executions, rape and other crimes, according to the United Nations and international rights groups.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said Wednesday that war crimes and “potentially” crimes against humanity were committed in the city, which the RSF seized in late October.
“We are talking about very serious atrocity crimes ... war crimes for sure (and) potentially also crimes against humanity,” he told journalists in Geneva. “We have an extremely serious situation.”
Türk warned atrocities also could happen in the central region of Kordofan where the RSF has intensified its attacks in recent months.
“We cannot allow a repeat of this absolutely horrific situation in Kordofan,” he said, calling for a ceasefire in the country.
The war in Sudan began in April 2023 over a power struggle between the miliary and the RSF. The conflict has killed over 40,000 people, a figure rights groups consider a significant undercount.
The fighting has wrecked urban areas and has been marked by atrocities, including mass rape and ethnically motivated killings, that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, especially in the western region of Darfur, according to the United Nations and international rights groups.
The war has also created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis and pushed parts of the country into famine.
