Notorious paramilitaries said they had seized a headquarters in the center of the besieged provincial capital of North Darfur, the Sudanese military's last stronghold in Darfur.
As fighting continued to rage on Monday in el-Fasher, a medical group said the Rapid Support Forces had killed dozens of civilians and destroyed health care infrastructure the previous day in the city, where hundreds of thousands of people have been trapped for more than a year.
Losing the 6th Division base is a major setback to the military and its allies. Fighting was continuing Monday morning around the airfield of the base, as well as on the western side of the city, according to Resistance Committees in el-Fasher, a grassroots group tracking the war. The group criticized the military for what it said was a lack of air support to troops trying to fend off the RSF attacks.
The military has yet to comment on the RSF capture of the base. However, military officials confirmed that troops vacated the base on Sunday and retreated to another defense line under heavy shelling and artillery attacks from the paramilitaries.
The Humanitarian Research Lab at Yale University, HRL, confirmed through satellite imagery that the RSF advanced Sunday as far as the 6th Division headquarters, with “significant evidence of close-quarter battle in the area.”
In a statement late Sunday, the HRL reported that it has identified activities likely showing RSF taking prisoners in and around the airfield area, which was the main base of military operations.
The Sudan Doctor Network, a medical group tracking the war, described the RSF attack as a “heinous massacre” during which the paramilitaries killed dozens of people.
In a statement Monday, the group said RSF fighters rampaged through parts of el-Fasher, looting hospitals and other medical facilities and “destroying what remained of essential life-supporting and health care infrastructure” in the city.
The Darfur Network for Human Rights reported that the RSF detained over 1,000 civilians after their capture of the base in what it called “a systematic targeting of civilians, arbitrary detentions and potential acts amounting to war crimes.”
Among the detained was a local journalist, who was one of the few journalists remaining in the city, according to the Sudanese Journalists Union.
The group warned about potential “mass violations” in el-Fasher similar to what happened in another Darfur city in 2023 when RSF fighters ran riot there killing hundreds of people and forcing hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.
Tom Fletcher, UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, expressed “deep alarm” at reports of civilian casualties and forced displacement in el-Fasher.
“Hundreds of thousands of civilians are trapped and terrified — shelled, starving, and without access to food, health care or safety,” he said in a statement. He called for “safe, rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access” to help the population who remained in the city.
Before Sunday’s attack, there were 260,000 civilians, half of them children, trapped inside the city living in “desperate conditions,” according to the UN children's agency.
Between 2,500 and 3,000 people were forced to flee their homes due to the latest fighting. They moved to other areas within the city, and could flee again toward other areas in North Darfur “depending on security conditions and movement restrictions,” the UN migration agency said.
The city is the military’s last stronghold in the Darfur region and has been at the epicenter of fighting for over a year between the Sudanese military and the RSF.
Sudan plunged into a war in April 2023 when simmering tension between the military and the RSF exploded into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum, and elsewhere in the northeastern African country.
The devastating war has killed over 40,000 people and created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis with part of the country plunged into famine. It has forced over 14 million people to flee their homes, with some crossing into neighboring countries.
It has been marked by gross atrocities including ethnically motivated killings and rape, according to the United Nations and rights groups. The International Criminal Court said it was investigating alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
