Fighting has intensified across Sudan as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group has launched attacks on the besieged city of el-Fasher in North Darfur and the North Kordofan city of Bara.
The RSF attacked Bara, a city 350km (215 miles) southwest of Khartoum, the capital, from multiple directions on Saturday morning, drawing artillery fire from the Sudanese armed forces (SAF), a military source told Al Jazeera.
The city is one of the largest urban areas under army control near the western front line with the RSF, but it is encircled by the paramilitary’s fighters.
Communications networks were cut off after the assault on North Kordofan’s second largest city. Clashes also continued in el-Fasher in the early hours with columns of smoke rising over the provincial capital as shelling and gunfire continued into the morning.
The paramilitary force published videos on Friday claiming its fighters had seized the North Darfur governor’s residence in el-Fasher and were now positioned near the SAF’s 6th Infantry Division headquarters, the army’s local command centre, according to the Sudan Tribune.
RSF fighters in the footage said they would advance on the city centre.
Humanitarian crisis ‘surpasses all comprehension’
A source within the 6th Infantry Division was quoted by the Sudan Tribune as saying a “cautious calm” had settled over el-Fasher by Friday morning after what he described as a major attack the previous day.
However, residents trapped in the besieged city remained under fire. “It’s happening everywhere, even near me. An artillery shell landed about 100 metres [110 yards] away,” one el-Fasher resident told Al Jazeera.
The escalation comes as medical workers warned that the humanitarian situation has reached catastrophic levels. Dr Razan Al-Mahdi, spokesperson for the Sudan Doctors Network, said in a statement on Thursday that the crisis in el-Fasher had “surpassed all comprehension”.
“Every passing day, we lose no fewer than three children as a result of malnutrition, disease, and the dire lack of medical and humanitarian resources,” she said.
Four United Nations agencies warned this week that thousands of children face imminent death as more than 250,000 civilians – half of them children – remained cut off from food and healthcare as a result of the 16-month siege of el-Fasher.
The agencies said health facilities had collapsed and children with severe malnutrition were now without treatment.
Save the Children said on Tuesday that at least 17 children were killed and 22 others wounded in el-Fasher during October alone, based on casualty data from the Sudan Doctors Network
Fighting in el-Fasher on Thursday saw the RSF launch what the SAF described as a significant assault from five directions. The army said it repelled that attack.
The war has also seen a sharp rise in drone strikes targeting civilian infrastructure.
UN expert Radhouane Nouicer raised concerns this week about intensifying drone strikes by both sides. RSF attacks on power infrastructure on Tuesday knocked out electricity across multiple cities and injured six workers.
For a fourth consecutive day on Friday, RSF drones targeted Khartoum International Airport, which the army had hoped to reopen after retaking the capital in March. The reopening has been postponed as a result.
The conflict, which began in April 2023, has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced 12 million and left 30 million in need of aid, making it the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.
Foreign Minister Mohieldin Salem visited Washington, DC, this weekend for talks on peace and humanitarian cooperation. After reports suggested indirect talks were being held between the SAF and RSF, the Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied them.
In recent months, United States President Donald Trump has repeatedly promised to intensify efforts to end the war in Sudan. But with his foreign policy focus currently zeroed in on shoring up a fragile Gaza ceasefire and finding a way to reach any type of ceasefire in Russia’s war in Ukraine, Sudan has not been a priority.
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