• SUDAN

Fight for Darfur and Khartoum intensifies

Buoyed by foreign backers and ignoring civilian casualties, both Burhan and Hemeti claim a breakthrough is in sight

For the next few months of the dry season, the rival factions look set to concentrate their forces in the devastating battles for control of two cities and environs – the capital Khartoum and El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. With no constraints on tactics and weapons used – mostly supplied by the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Turkey, Russia, Belarus, China and Iran – tens of thousands of civilians will be caught in the fighting. They will have little chance of finding a passage out nor will relief agencies be able or allowed to meet the rising demand for emergency medicine and foodstuffs.

This latest chapter of the war started at the UN General Assembly in New York, which was meant to launch an internationally backed initiative for a humanitarian ceasefire and louder calls for outsiders to stop supplying arms to the combatants.

On 26 September, the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) commander General Abdel Fattah al Burhan addressed the UN General Assembly, savouring this shred of international recognition which was conceded to him in the hope that he would join serious negotiations for a ceasefire.

That hope was misplaced. Burhan’s SAF has proved even more unwilling than its opponent, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo ‘Hemeti’, to send representatives to ceasefire negotiations. So far neither has faced serious pressure, on or off the battlefield, to negotiate.

Khartoum offensive
As Burhan was speaking at the General Assembly, the SAF launched an ambitious offensive against RSF positions in Khartoum. For over a year, the RSF has dominated the capital, forcing anyone with enough funds to flee.

SAF contingents crossed the Fatihab and White Nile bridges into Khartoum within hours. In Bahri, North Khartoum, SAF soldiers crossed the Halfaya bridge, to reach the Kadaroo area, adjacent to the old city and housing the base of the Signal Corps.

The battle has raged for days. It could lead to the first significant SAF victory, giving Burhan’s forces control of the area between the Presidential Palace and the SAF General Command centre. Last year, the RSF forced the SAF to move its government headquarters to Port Sudan from Khartoum, a serious humiliation.

In the late dry season last year, the RSF won a series of battles in Nyala, Zalingei, Jebel Aulia, Ardamata, and Wad Medani. It also managed to overwhelm Sennar State just before the rainy season in July. Only Sennar city is still under SAF control, but it is surrounded by RSF troops.

Judging the military power of each side is complicated by the role of outsiders. The RSF, with many of its soldiers having fought in Yemen and Libya, was clearly in the ascendant for the early months of the war. Now the SAF looks determined to use its air power advantage and shipments of new heavy weapons to step up pressure on the Hemeti’s forces and their Arab militia allies.

Both sides are using armed drones in the battles for Khartoum and El Fasher with little consideration for the civilians in the firing line. Given the high stakes in the cities, RSF and SAF commanders are accompanying their troops to the front lines, their paths cleared by armed drones.

For the RSF, the stakes are highest in El Fasher. Even a pyrrhic victory there would allow it to claim titular control over the vast Darfur region (much bigger than France), or at least its five state capitals. But the reality is that any claimed victory would trigger a fresh insurgency, and spread northwards to Libya. 

The RSF has lost some of its most important commanders, including Central Darfur Gen Ali Yakoub Gibril, in June 2024, and commanders Major Abdulrahman ‘Girn Shatta’ and Maj Abu al Qassim Ali Mussa, who were killed in a neighbourhood south-east of El Fasher in early September.

This intense fighting has forced some of the armed groups in Darfur to abandon their former neutrality, born from a distrust of both sides. Most with bases in the state are siding with the SAF, which would complicate if not doom any effort by the RSF to run an administration there.

During the rains in mid-year, the RSF launched attacks on the city, destroying houses, markets and clinics, and thousands of residents fled to areas protected by ostensibly neutral armed groups, such as the Sudan Liberation Army, led by Abdel Wahid al Nur.

New tactics
More recently, both sides shifted their tactics in and around El Fasher. RSF slowed down its hit-and-run operations after shelling neighbourhoods. Instead, it has been trying to keep troops inside the city, slowly increasing the areas under its control.

The SAF and the allied Darfuri armed movements, mainly those led by Minni Arkoi Minawi of SLA-MM and Jibril Ibrahim of the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), fought hard to resist and retake the offensive.

Mellit, 60 kilometres north of El Fasher, used as a forward base by the RSF, was bombed several times causing heavy civilian casualties. The SAF’s 6th division brought in reinforcements and vital materiel to share with its allies. Caterpillars speedily built military fortifications. Both sides are using snipers and drones to lethal effect, But we hear the Chinese drones are less accurate in targeting missiles.

As the SAF launched its offensive in Khartoum, its aircraft also bombed Nyala Airport in Darfur on 24, 26, and 28 September. It was responding to reports that an Ilyushin IL-78, operated by the UAE, had landed in Nyala on 21 September. 

No reliable sources have yet confirmed whether it was carrying military supplies. But we hear that it was bringing in some RSF leaders, including Hemeti’s brother, Abdel Rahim. It was also said to be carrying some humanitarian aid to give some reality to an agreement reached in Switzerland in August (AC Vol 65 No 18, Swiss dead-end prompts policy rethink). In that deal, the RSF promised to allow deliveries of humanitarian aid at several Darfur airports that it controls. The SAF bombing of Nyala killed several UAE soldiers who were involved in the logistics, provoking the wrath of Abu Dhabi.

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