The United Nations had described it as a war of atrocities, yet the brutalities of the Sudanese civil war were almost forgotten by the world – until now.
This week, more than two thousand unarmed civilians were slaughtered in the country in just a matter of 48 hours as its bloody conflict rages on.
The war has plunged Sudan into hell, turning it into the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. More than 150,000 people have been killed across the country, while men and children have been forced to watch the horrific rape of wives, mothers, and daughters.
In El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, the Rapid Support Forces, a paramilitary determined to establish a parallel government, swept through streets swollen with displaced families on Monday, after an 18-month siege.
The Sudanese army’s final positions buckled, and aid groups and medics reported mass executions, house-to-house killings and bodies littered across bloodied streets.
Satellite images picked up what analysts say are clusters and stains consistent with mass graves and mass casualty scenes, while terrified survivors fled with stories of children shot in their beds and patients gunned down in hospital wards.
On Wednesday, it was reported that more than 460 people at a maternity hospital had been gunned down. In a social media post, the Sudan Network Doctors said: ‘The Rapid Support Forces yesterday … killed in cold blood everyone they found inside the Saudi hospital.’
Nurse Nawal Khalil was caring for six patients when the militants charged in. She said: ‘They killed six wounded soldiers and civilians in their beds. Some of them were women.
‘I don’t know what happened to my other patients. I had to flee when they stormed the hospital.’
Harrowing videos spread on social media have shown how unarmed people have been lined up and executed one after the other by members of the paramilitary. Many of the clips show a pile of bodies in the aftermath of the RSF’s bloodthirsty violence.
In one horrendous clip, an armed man, identified as Al-Fateh Abdullah Idris, dressed in military fatigues, films himself as he ruthlessly executes a group of men after they begged for their lives. In other clips, he brags that he may have been personally responsible for the deaths of the 2,000 killed.
Videos like his have circulated showing fighters celebrating over the bodies of those they have murdered.
Throughout the war, sexual violence has been prevalent. Women being raped and turned into sexual slaves have been reported. Survivors have told of abductions, sexual slavery and rape used as punishment for ethnicity or perceived loyalty.
In April 2025, Amnesty published an investigation titled They Raped All of Us. It documented RSF soldiers raping and gang raping women and girls as young as 15 in multiple states between April 2023 and October 2024.
A 30-year-old other, Hamida, who lived in Madani in Gezeira state, spoke about how she was attacked after morning prayers. She recounted: ‘One of the men grabbed me and said he wanted to rape me. I tried to resist, but he hit me with his gun and said I am going to rape your small daughter if you resist.
‘Two of them then tied my hands together, and they removed my clothes. Three of them raped me while my daughter was watching. It was so humiliating.
The Sudan civil war, which began in 2023, has left 150,000 dead across the country and over 12 million people displaced
A massacre in a maternity hospital earlier this week left 460 people dead, including patients and hospital workers
Clips spread on social media this week showed how unarmed civilians were rounded up by RFS members and slaughtered
‘I did not go to any hospital because I did not want anyone to know about it. You are the first people I am sharing this with. I feel broken.’
Amina, a mother of six, told investigators her harrowing story. ‘One of them forcefully tied my arms behind my back, and the other raped me in front of my 11-year-old son,’ she said.
‘My son screamed at them, saying “leave my mother alone, stay away from my mum.” One of them hit my son in the back with his gun butt and broke his backbone. My beloved son, Mohamed, died 17 days later.’
She was also impregnated by her rapist and had a boy. There was no medical care available to her during her pregnancy.
Investigators also spoke to Hussein, a 42-year-old man who was bungled into one room in his home alongside his wife and sisters-in-law. He said: ‘They asked us to lie on the floor. They took her gold and then the four of them raped her in front of me and my two kids.
‘I tried to stand and stop them from raping my wife, and then one of them shot my wife in the chest. She died immediately. They then started beating me badly with their guns until I fainted.
‘Another group of RSF soldiers came to our house and raped my sisters-in-law. It was the darkest day of my life.’
In a separate analysis this year, the UNICEF shockingly said children as young as one were being raped and sexually assaulted.
At the time, it was found that more than 200 children had been raped at the start of the year. The report said that the number was just a small fraction of the total number of cases.
An armed man, identified as Abdullah Idris, dressed in military fatigues, is filmed as he ruthlessly executes a group of men who beg for their lives
A Sudanese woman who fled after the paramilitary killed thousands of people at a camp in Tawila on October 30
Members of the Sudanese Red Crescent carry a bloated body dumped in a well in March 2025. There were 14 other bodies in the well, causing a foul stench
Four one-year-olds were among the survivors of sexual abuse, while 16 were children under the age of five. In the 221 cases reported, 66 per cent of the victims were girls, while 33 per cent were boys.
One distressing testimony by an adult called Omina said: ‘After nine at night, someone opens the door, carrying a whip, selects one of the girls, and takes her to another room. I could hear the little girl crying and screaming. They were raping her.’
The report said: ‘In addition to rape and gang rape, RSF soldiers also subjected women and girls to other forms of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, including beatings, cutting them with sharp blades and pouring hot and melting liquid on their body, inflicting women with severe bodily injuries.
‘The widespread sexual and other violence by the RSF in the current conflict is happening against the backdrop of decades of impunity for such crimes where perpetrators went unpunished.’
It detailed how many survivors have gone on to develop health conditions such as kidney pains, irregular periods, and memory loss. Women medical workers were raped and forced to treat injured RSF fighters.
This week, analysts confirmed that the RSF overran El-Shafir, the army’s last stronghold in Darfur, calling it a terrible escalation that changes the shape of the war.
For months, the United Nations and aid agencies begged the world to act as fighting closed in – instead, the last sanctuary in Darfur became a death trap.
The Sudanese Armed Forces pulled out after a siege that had strangled the city’s supply routes and starved families who had fled other massacres. When the walls finally fell on 26 and 27 October, relief did not come, but execution squads did.
One mother of five spoke about how armed men raided her family home. She told AP: ‘They took my phone, even searched my underwear and killed my 16-year-old son.’
Other witnesses described bodies in the streets, while another said RSF fighters wanted to cut off their heads with knives.
People fleeing from the area, including pregnant women, the elderly, and small children, were forced to trek for miles to neighbouring Twila in their desperate attempt to reach safety.
Many said that as they made the journey, they were met with bodies lined up on the path. Only a few thousand have survived the dreadful journey.
A rights advocate warned: ‘Men are just not arriving. Either they were killed, disappeared or lost along the way.’ Those who did not manage to escape are now at the mercy of the brutal RSF fighters.
A screen grab showing members of the RFS celebrating in the street after the fall of El Fasher earlier this week
Satellite images picked up what analysts say are clusters and stains consistent with mass graves and mass casualty scenes
Aerial images show pools of blood and bodies on the ground in the aftermath of this week’s horrific attacks
The new development is another chapter in the East African country’s astonishing record of instability – since gaining independence in 1956, the country has seen 20 bloody coups. It has also had three civil wars, which have now killed close to four million people in total.
Its latest horrific war began in April 2023 when two military leaders who once shared power turned their guns on each other after President Omar al-Bashir was overthrown in a coup in 2019.
On one side stands the Sudanese Armed Forces led by Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. On the other, is the Rapid Support Forces, commanded by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, best known as Hemedti.
The RSF evolved out of the Janjaweed militias of the early 2000s, accused of ethnic cleansing in Darfur. A plan to fold the RSF into the country’s formal army fell apart, leading to intense fighting.
The frontline in Khartoum choked the capital with corpses and gunfire. However, in Darfur, the fighting took on a darker dimension. Villages burned, and non Arab communities like the Masalit and Zaghawa were hunted.
Human Rights Watch published a 218-page report in May 2024 documenting ethnic cleansing in West Darfur. It described rape, torture, mass executions, the razing of neighbourhoods and a massacre as civilians tried to flee El Geneina in June 2023.
After the Battle of Geneina in 2023, it was reported that more than a thousand bodies had been dumped in mass graves. In January last year, a UN report concluded that between 10,000 to 15,000 people had been slaughtered in El Geneina.
People fleeing the area to find refuge in the surrounding regions said they were brutally abused by the RSF. One pregnant woman was reportedly shot by the group for not having enough money to leave Dafur.
Other massacres followed that year – it was reported that it was mostly the Masalit ethnic group and darker-skinned Sudanese people being targeted.
On June 20, 2023, the Sultanate of Dar Masalit said that more than 5,000 people were killed in Geneina in the span of just two months. Photos from the massacres showed bodies strewn across roads, left to rot.
The United Nations warned repeatedly that what was happening could amount to crimes against humanity. The same patterns rolled across the map with frightening predictability, leaving a trail of fire and bodies.
On 16 August 2025, the RSF reportedly shelled the famine-stricken Abu Shouk camp near El Fasher, killing at least 31 people, including seven children and a pregnant woman, and wounding others.
Earlier, in April 2025, the RSF carried out large-scale attacks on both Zamzam and Abu Shouk Camps, where hundreds were killed and dozens of structures destroyed. Rights groups say these were ethnically targeted operations in the lead-up to the El Fasher siege.
Last month, a drone strike hit a mosque near the Abu Shouk Camp during morning prayers, killing at least 70 worshippers. Bodies lay across prayer mats, including elderly men and young boys.
These camps were among the most vulnerable: displaced, starving, often women and children.
Christian sites were also attacked – in June this year, an attack on three churches in North Darfur killed a priest and several worshippers. Survivors have also said civilians were lured to fake water points, only to be executed and their bodies taken away to hide signs of the atrocities.
Children have also been recruited to fight against the SAF, according to multiple reports. In 2024, Sky News Arabia documented that it was not just the RSF recruiting minors into its ranks.
A report in Sky News Arabia documented that children are being recruited to fight in the war
Sudanese army soldiers patrol an area in November 2024. The takeover of El Fasher has now put a huge dent in the army’s goal of becoming the sole security force in the country
A school building in El Shafer, where children should have been studying, was turned into a centre to house displaced people. A photograph dated October 7, 2025, shows how it suffered from shelling
It was reported that hundreds of children between the ages of 12 and 14 had been seen at a military camp near the River Nile State.
The report suggested that the minors had been tasked with completing gruelling challenges to prepare them for war.
By mid-2024, famine was confirmed in the Zamzam displacement camp near El Fasher, where many children starved to death.
UN famine monitors confirmed Zamzam famine thresholds in August 2024, reporting that children died in front of feeding centres because there was nothing left to give them.
The situation became so dire that desperate mothers were forced to mix animal feed into boiling water to keep toddlers alive for one more day.
Videos of Sudan’s national museum showed that several priceless items had been stolen after the SAF recaptured the area. The army accused the RSF of ransacking the museum and taking items dating back to 2500BC.
In December 2023, civilians reported that items from their homes were looted by the Sudanese army. People living in the Ombada district said those who tried to stop the men from stealing were shot and killed.
The war has also led to a damning health crisis, with the spread of diseases such as cholera, malaria, and measles. With the collapse of the healthcare system, thousands of people have died due to a lack of treatment.
In late 2025, it was reported that over 3,000 people had died from cholera. Infrastructure damage has also led to shortages of clean water, electricity and access to medical supplies.
Both sides have now been accused of committing war crimes, blurring the lines between who is right and wrong.
Matt Ward, deputy director of analysis at Oxford Analytica covering East Africa, told Daily Mail: War crimes have certainly been committed on both sides, but the RSF’s conduct has generated a lot more attention, in part because of its roots in the Janjaweed militias accused of genocide in Darfur in the 2000s.
‘It is also because the scale and regularity of the atrocities committed by RSF forces far surpass those committed by SAF or SAF-allied militias, unacceptable though these also are.
‘Many of the RSF fighters are motivated by the fact that they have been given carte blanche to attack and loot communities deemed to support the enemy, and this has become a central plank of the RSF’s war economy.’
The world, having watched for too long, is now forced to respond.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in a stern statement issued on 28 October, said it was ‘appalled by the RSF’s endless and wanton disregard for civilian life’ in El Fasher and called for ‘immediate access for humanitarian aid and a full investigation into possible crimes against humanity and war crimes’.
In Washington, the tone shifted in January 2025, when the United States officially determined that the RSF had committed genocide in Darfur, a rare use of the word by a superpower.
A body is covered outside a house in Ginenea in June 2023. Survivors have spoken about how armed men barged into their homes and executed loved ones
People who fled the Zamzam camp queue up for food rations. The war has plunged large parts of Sudan into famine. Diseases such as cholera have also spread across the country
People passing through a section of Omdurman, where bodies remain on the street days after fighting
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Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared the finding was based on ‘systematic murder, the targeting of ethnic groups, mass rape and forced displacement.’ Sanctions were imposed on RSF leader Dagalo and his network.
Yet sanction statements and diplomatic condemnations have not translated into safe corridors or a halt to the slaughter.
Throughout the conflict, ceasefires were often announced only for them to be broken, leading to further executions.
The UN’s humanitarian coordinator in Sudan, Clementine Nkweta‑Salami, reported earlier this year that the RSF was blocking life-saving aid into famine-hit Darfur and that aid convoys were being diverted, delayed or looted.
Outside actors have been accused of pouring gasoline on the fire – several investigations have reported that the United Arab Emirates has been sending supplies of weapons to the RSF, including Chinese drones.
This is despite an international arms embargo. Last year, it was alleged that the UAE was supplying the militia through a complicated network that encompasses Libya, Chad, Uganda, and some areas of Somalia.
In May, Sudan’s security and defence council announced that it was cutting all diplomatic ties with the UAE over its support of the RSF.
A day before that declaration, the International Court of Justice dismissed a case against the UAE, accusing it of complicity in genocide.
Speaking about why the war remained in the shadows and its possible resolution, Ward said: ‘With the only partial exception of some regional states in Africa and the Middle East, few international stakeholders have substantial interests that are affected by the situation in Sudan and therefore nobody has been willing to expend limited political capital on the issue.
‘Relatedly, the situation is extremely complex, and a resolution to the issue will be extraordinarily difficult to deliver, which has deterred peacemaking efforts that are seen as difficult, arduous and unlikely to deliver any “quick wins”.
‘This is mainly due to domestic factors, including the balance of power between the belligerents, the incompatibility of their war objectives and their refusal to countenance compromise, and the incompatibility of the belligerents’ visions for the future of Sudan with the aspirations of the Sudanese people themselves for a return to civilian rule.
With reports suggesting that countries such as Egypt, Iran, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are helping to fund the Sudanese army, Ward believes no ‘real pressure’ has been put on international actors to stop pouring money into the war.
‘With only very limited exceptions, there has been no real pressure on any of the external sponsors of Sudan’s war to change their behaviour, and there is thus no real cost for them in continuing their support,’ he said. ‘Until this equation changes, external support to Sudan’s warring parties will continue.
General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, seen here in 2021 is the head of the Sudanese army
The RSF’s commander, Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, disagreed with Burhan on a number of issues, resulting in the civil war
A photo taken in June 2023 shows bodies piled up on the streets after an attack
Smoke rises from fires in the satellite image taken by Vantor. People who escaped spoke about walking for miles to get to safety
While the US has significantly provided aid to the country, it announced cuts earlier this year. The United Kingdom has also pledged £230million in aid.
Meanwhile, the UN has appealed for countries to do more to help solve the widespread hunger and displacement.
Ward, however, believes this is not enough. He said: ‘The international response to the conflict so far has been very weak.
‘There have been a multitude of proposed peace initiatives, with no clear overarching plan or vision of how to bring the belligerent parties to the table, or how to transform a long-sought-for ceasefire into a credible transition to peace, let alone a transition to civilian rule.
‘Aid cuts and a lack of serious pressure on the parties and their external backers to ensure humanitarian access mean the international response to the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis has been deeply inadequate.
‘There is no real sense that the tragedy unfolding in El Fasher is likely to change this equation dramatically. Although there have been various expressions of concern from international actors, this has not been tied to any concrete policy proposals or even any greater sense of urgency to develop any.
‘The United States, which is supposed to be leading the latest mediation effort towards Sudan, has been conspicuously silent on the issue, especially at the higher levels of government.’
El Fasher’s fall effectively splits Sudan, with a population of over 50 million, into two rival fiefdoms. The RSF now controls most of Darfur. It has a rival government, ironically dubbed the Government of Peace and Unity.
The army clings to the east and the Red Sea corridor around Port Sudan. It is the kind of map that ends badly for civilians – two men claiming a nation, both determined not to back down, and both armed by foreign friends who deny involvement while bodies stack up.
