Six peacekeepers from Bangladesh were killed on Saturday when a drone fired on their base in southern Sudan, the United Nations said, in the deadliest single episode for the international body in Sudan since the country plunged into civil war over two years ago.
The attack on the United Nations base in the Kordofan region, the main focus of fighting in recent weeks, drew instant condemnation from the government of Bangladesh, one of the largest contributors to peacekeeping missions around the world, and was the subject of heated recriminations inside Sudan.
António Guterres, the U.N. secretary general, strongly condemned the violence, saying on X, “Attacks against U.N. peacekeepers like this one are unjustifiable and may constitute war crimes.”
Sudan’s military blamed the attack on the rival Rapid Support Forces, or R.S.F., the paramilitary group it is fighting for control of Sudan. In a statement, it said the group had fired three missiles into the base, which also wounded seven Bangladeshis and torched a warehouse.
The U.N. peacekeeping mission, which has been deployed to the area since 2011, did not say who carried out the strike. There was no immediate comment from the Rapid Support Forces.
Footage circulating online showed plumes of black smoke pouring from a compound. Military analysts following the war pinpointed it as the U.N. compound in Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan State.
The strike followed a succession of R.S.F. victories in western and southwestern Sudan in recent months. In October its forces captured El Fasher, in the western Darfur region, breaking a brutal 18-month siege of the city.
The victory consolidated the paramilitary group’s dominance of Darfur but drew global accusations of abuses by its troops, including massacres, torture and rape, often directed at civilians fleeing El Fasher.
The allegations of atrocities also heightened scrutiny of the R.S.F.’s main foreign sponsor, the United Arab Emirates, which American officials say has provided many of the drones and other powerful weapons used by the paramilitary group.
The Emirates denies backing either side in the war.
Since it seized El Fasher, the R.S.F. has pushed east into Kordofan, the region separating Darfur from the military-dominated east of the country. As it captures territory, the paramilitary has faced accusations of new atrocities, including attacks on a kindergarten and a hospital that killed 114 people, according to the World Health Organization.
Still, its forces continue to advance. The U.N. base hit on Saturday is 70 miles northeast of the Heglig oil field, which houses one of Sudan’s biggest oil facilities and was seized by the R.S.F. on Monday.
Previously, the deadliest episode for the United Nations during Sudan’s war was an attack on an aid convoy in June that killed five people.
The slain Bangladeshis were part of a peacekeeping force known as the United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei, which has been in place since 2011. As South Sudan seceded from Sudan that year, a dispute erupted over the oil-rich Abiyei region, which both countries claimed.
The United Nations initially deployed Ethiopian troops, but the mission to Abiyei has since expanded to include those from other nations. In 2022 the mission had an authorized troop ceiling of 3,250 peacekeepers and 640 police personnel.
The peacekeepers managed largely to stay out of Sudan’s civil war until this past week, when fighting spread to the area where they are deployed.
The situation in the area was still unstable and clashes were ongoing, Bangladesh’s military said in a statement, adding that the authorities were doing their best to rescue and treat those hurt.
Declan Walsh is the chief Africa correspondent for The Times based in Nairobi, Kenya. He previously reported from Cairo, covering the Middle East, and Islamabad, Pakistan.
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