At least 30 civilians and 17 soldiers were killed as the RSF advanced further towards the capital of North Darfur, the governor says.
Dozens of civilians and soldiers were killed in the latest bout of violence in the Sudanese town of el-Fasher on Friday, the local governor said, as fighting in the country shows no signs of abating more than a year after the conflict began. .
At least 30 civilians and 17 soldiers were killed in attacks in the city, Minni Minnawi said Saturday. “This shows that the objective of those who attack El Fasher is to exterminate the city.”
The war in Sudan broke out in mid-April last year when a simmering dispute between the leaders of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) erupted into violence.
The fighting has killed thousands of people, displaced nearly 9 million and caused imminent famine and a serious humanitarian crisis. While the war began in the capital, Khartoum, it spread to Darfur and unleashed ethnic violence, resurfacing old rivalries dating back to a brutal war in the early 2000s.
El-Fasher is the last domino yet to fall in Darfur, as the RSF has taken control of almost all major cities in the western state of Sudan.
The RSF's continued advances on the ground led former Darfur rebel leaders Minnawi and Jibril Ibrahim to break months of neutrality and declare in November last year their intention to join the war on the side of the SAF. The RSF emerged from what rebel groups call the “Janjaweed,” an Arab force that killed thousands of non-Arabs in Darfur during the war in the region, which began in 2003 and ended with a peace deal in 2020.
Since Minnawi and Ibrahim's announcement, the Sudanese army has maintained a presence in the city, making it the last bastion of forces fighting the RSF.
“He [civilian] “The coordination of the Democratic Civil Forces and the groups that sponsor and finance them are patiently awaiting the fall of El Fashir to declare the birth of their racial militia state in the skulls of the children of Darfur in western Sudan,” Minnawi said. referring to a civilian group accused of allying with the RSF.
Thousands of civilians are trapped because of the fighting. Alex de Waal, executive director of the World Peace Foundation, said the fall of el-Fashir could lead to larger-scale brutality against civilians and that a famine is already developing in Darfur.
“El Fashir is important for several reasons,” added De Waal. “It is the last bastion of the internationally recognized government… in Darfur. It is also a place where other armed groups that are allied with the government hide.
“So if it fell into the hands of the RSF, not only would we see the kind of rampage and mass looting that we have seen elsewhere, but we would probably also [a] large-scale massacre of civilians.”
