Description: Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have continued to lay siege on the city of El Fasher in the Darfur province through intensified aerial campaign which has killed 60 civilians and critically injured more than 20 other. The attacks were conducted in the Dar al – Arqam displacement camp where the RSF used drones and artillery to allegedly target Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). Last week, the RSF was also accused of attacking a hospital in El Fasher, killing more than 13 people. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, has stated that the organization in the strongest possible terms condemns the targeting of civilians and reiterates its appeal for engaging into diplomatic resolution of the conflict. The RSF, through intensified aerial campaigns, which have led to massive loss of civilian life, is aiming at pushing the SAF completely out of the Darfur region in order to legitimize its parallel government.
Impact: RSF’s indiscriminate targeting of civilians illustrates the atrocities of the civil war in Sudan where the power struggle to control the country has already caused the deaths of 150 thousand people and the displacement of additional 12 million. Both warring parties have so far ignored calls for peaceful resolution while foreign interference has intensified inflaming the armed fighting and the battle for territorial prevalence in the country. The humanitarian corridors remained closed, as all and any influx of humanitarian aid is controlled by the armed group controlling the points of infill. Diplomatic efforts have also stalled while the risk of regional widespread instability is substantially increased with civil war concerns rising in neighboring South Sudan accompanied by the reignited tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea.