A sustained Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) offensive has reclaimed areas of Sudan controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Khartoum State and North Darfur State.
On February 19, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) said it killed 33 RSF fighters northeast of the strategic North Darfur town of el-Fasher, capital of North Darfur State. That day, the RSF also bombed el-Fasher, killing at least 10 people, injuring dozens and burning several houses. This caused about 10,000 families to flee to a neighboring camp for displaced people.
El-Fasher has been under siege by the RSF since May 2024.
“The countdown for an end of the war has begun, the field of war has moved to El Fasher … , ”Osman Mirghani, editor-in-chief of the Sudanese newspaper Al-Tayar, told Deutsche Welle’s radio show “Sudan Now.”
The SAF, led by Gen. Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan, made progress in RSF-controlled areas late last year and into February, gaining ground in Khartoum, the national capital, White Nile State and North Kordofan State, where the SAF reclaimed the capital city of el-Obeid on February 24, ending a two-year siege. The RSF is led by Gen. Mohammed Dagalo, or “Hemedti.”
Sudanese Finance Minister Jibril Ibrahim told the BBC that the SAF’s victory in el-Obeid was a “massive step” in lifting the RSF siege of el-Fasher and would allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to Kordofan. It was reclaimed hours after the RSF signed a political charter in Kenya to establish a breakaway government in areas under its control. El-Obeid is a strategic hub connecting Darfur to Khartoum.
In Khartoum State, the SAF now controls 90% of Bahri in the north, most of Omdurman in the west, and 60% of central Khartoum, where the presidential palace and international airport are located, Anadolu Agency reported. The SAF had nearly encircled these cities, while RSF fighters remain entrenched in neighborhoods in the east and south.
According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), the battle for Khartoum likely will deepen the involvement of regional powers. International mediators likely will wait for the fighting there to settle before calling for new peace talks.
Once fighting in Khartoum ends, mediators “should push Burhan, Hemedti and outside parties to end the war, even if that prospect will probably hinge on a rapprochement between the army chief and the UAE, the RSF’s main patron,” the ICG reported.
The RSF still controls four of the Darfur region’s five states.
Both sides are accused of committing atrocities against civilians. In January, the RSF killed at least 70 people in an attack on el-Fasher’s last functioning hospital. Since the war began, about 70 SAF airstrikes have hit el-Koma, about 75 kilometers northeast of el-Fasher. These attacks intensified recently, forcing residents and displaced people to flee.
“Those who are unable to leave have begun to go out in the morning to spend the day in the open and then return in the evening in the bitter cold to avoid being hit,” civil society activist Saleh Harirein told Sudan’s Radio Dabanga.
In October 2024, dozens of people were killed and more than 200 wounded by SAF air raids on el-Koma’s town market.
“It is impossible for a country’s army to bomb people with its air force and claim that it is doing so to protect the country,” a local official told Radio Dabanga.
In South Darfur State in mid-February, the Sudanese Air Force targeted Nyala Airport and neighborhoods in the eastern part of the city with eight barrel bombs, but no fatalities were reported.
Since it erupted in April 2023, Sudan’s war has fueled the world’s largest and fastest displacement crisis and the largest humanitarian crisis on record, according to the International Rescue Committee (IRC). More than
11.4 million people are now displaced within the country, and more than 3 million people, mostly women and children, have fled to neighboring countries.
During the 2024 lean season, 750,000 people across Sudan faced catastrophic food insecurity, meaning that death by starvation was happening daily. The war has disrupted supply lines, and at least 25 humanitarian aid workers were killed in Sudan last year.
“An immediate ceasefire is now more critical than ever to prevent mass deaths resulting from a hunger crisis that is rapidly spreading across Sudan,” IRC country director for Sudan, Eatizaz Yousif, said on the organization’s website.
