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A nurse named Nawal Khalil had been serving as a medical volunteer for three years within the South El Fasher hospital when the city was taken over on Sunday by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). She was busy treating patients, including an elderly woman who needed a blood transfusion, when the attack began.

“They murdered six wounded military personnel and civilians in their beds – including some women,” she recounts. “I am unaware of the fate for my remaining patients. I had to run as they invaded the hospital.”

Khalil, 27, was shot in the right foot and thigh during the RSF's seizure of the adjacent military command center. She escaped from the city and traveled on foot for one day, hurt and lacking sustenance, to reach the town of Garney. “On the way, they seized my mobile and money,” she describes. “I possessed nothing remaining.”

Over a thousand individuals – comprising women and children – journeyed by walking for 48 hours to get to the settlement of Tawila in North Darfur after running from El Fasher, which fell under control after a year-and-a-half-long siege.

This settlement, about 34 miles (55km) west of El Fasher, is under the control by the SLA faction under Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur's leadership.

This past Tuesday, the Joint Forces – which partner with Sudan's military – charged the RSF for slaughtering in excess of 2,000 non-combatants after the city's capture. The UN said that footage existed featuring numerous unarmed males either being shot or deceased, encircled by RSF combatants.”

Historical Background

Hostilities commenced in Khartoum during April of 2023 as a growing contest for power between the two main factions of the armed forces leadership eventually resulted in fatalities.

From one perspective stand the Sudanese military forces, which maintain general loyalty to Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the country’s de facto ruler. Opposing him stand the paramilitary forces of the RSF paramilitary group, a gathering of armed factions which support the ex-warlord Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, referred to as Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the previous authoritarian leader Bashir's regime as an Arab anti-rebellion militia called the Janjaweed, that rapidly became associated with massive human rights violations. In 2013, Bashir transformed the group to become the RSF, using them to quell a recent insurrection within South Darfur.

The fighting has thrown Sudan into “one of the worst humanitarian nightmares in modern times, according to UN officials. It has generated the world’s worst displacement crisis, forcing more than 10 million persons within the country and 4 million who have fled to bordering states, creating increasing strain on Chad and South Sudan.

Present Circumstances

According to witnesses, thousands more civilians remain trapped by the RSF and allied militias within Garney, southwest from El Fasher. Numerous are ex-military personnel from the Sudanese army, the Joint Forces and other armed groups that had been fighting alongside the army. Reports indicate they're imprisoned as they lack funds for ransom demands of between 5m and 10m Sudanese pounds (approximately £6,000-£12,000), per those who escaped who reached Tawila. People who cannot afford payment remain imprisoned for several days, and sometimes released only after becoming gravely ill.

Reports suggest the SLA-AW has authorized military personnel escaping El Fasher to access Tawila if they relinquish their arms.

A man named Adam Yagoub, 28, a driver from Sennar from central Sudanese regions, narrowly escaped being killed after being captured by three camel-riding militiamen near Garney.

“They planned to decapitate me with a knife,” he recounts, exhibiting his limb, which one of the fighters hit with the butt of an AK-47 rifle. “Afterward one remembered me – his brother had worked with me – and urged them not to execute me. We were 18 people who left El Fasher together, yet merely eight reached Tawila. I think the others are dead.”

Yagoub reports he saw 22 bodies near what he called a “fake well” utilized by RSF forces and partner armed groups in the area connecting Garney and Tawila. “This is an ambush,” he comments. “Individuals travel all day lacking water, and upon arriving there, the militiamen await. They slaughtered 22 men on that spot and removed the corpses to hide them.”

Another nurse who escaped El Fasher South hospital subsequent to Sunday's offensive reported RSF militiamen penetrated using one doorway and commenced firing upon patients in the ER section, causing at least eight fatalities. “We escaped through a different gate, yet they assaulted my head using a rifle,” he recounts.

Via a recorded message on Wednesday, the leader of the RSF, Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, said that any soldier or officer who had “violated the right of any individual would face consequences.

Several people who got away El Fasher utilized hours hiding near the army’s artillery unit before running west during nighttime. Families already uprooted originating from the urban Abu Shouk settlement had to displace once more, finding shelter in Daraja Oula area before finally moving toward Tawila.

People apprehended by RSF forces within Garney reportedly received {water mixed with flour|flour