The changing focus of Sudan’s civil war Towards the vast Kordofan regionIn the south-central part of the country, the level of violence in the region is increasing alarmingly. In recent weeks, fighting between the army, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and a powerful local armed group allied with them has intensified, especially in the west and south, thwarting recent diplomatic efforts to reach a humanitarian ceasefire. The escalation in fighting is also occurring amid new, widespread atrocities committed against the civilian population.
Kordofan consists of three states, and controlling them is essential for the two main sides. This would allow the army to halt the advance of the paramilitary forces and provide a foothold from which to attack the western Darfur region, the center of gravity of the RSF. As for the Rapid Support Forces, they represent an advanced defense of their fiefdoms in the region, reinforce the division of Sudan and allow them to threaten the country’s capital, Khartoum. In Kordofan, paramilitary forces have good support networks and fight alongside the SPLM-N, with a notable presence in the south.
On Monday, the Rapid Support Forces were able to take full control of the city of Babanusa, the last army stronghold in West Kordofan state, which borders Darfur and is currently under the full control of paramilitary forces, with the exception of Heglig, an area close to South Sudan where some oil fields are located. Babanusa had been under siege for two years and almost all of its population had fled before its fall, but paramilitary forces have detained more than 100 families in recent days, including children and pregnant women, and subjected some to ill-treatment, according to the Sudan Doctors Network.
After the fall of Babanusa, the front shifted mainly towards South Kordofan, which is witnessing the heaviest fighting in the region since the outbreak of the war. In recent days, the army and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North have exchanged strikes in areas that have been under the control of the rebel group for nearly three decades. The goal of the regular forces is to try to break the joint siege imposed by paramilitary forces and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North on the two largest cities in the region, Kadugli and Dilling, which are already suffering from famine conditions.
Since violence began to focus in Kordofan in late October, the UN Human Rights Office has documented the killing of more than 250 civilians in air strikes, artillery shelling and executions. It is feared that the real number is much higher, but it is difficult to know this due to the difficulty of collecting information due to communications outages. The same office claims to have also received reports of sexual violence, revenge killings, kidnappings and arbitrary arrests of civilians accused of collaborating with the enemy.
Many of the civilian deaths are victims of indiscriminate bombing. In early November, the Rapid Support Forces killed 45 people, most of them women, in a drone attack on a funeral near El Obeid, the capital of North Kordofan, according to the United Nations. At the end of the same month, army forces bombed the city of Kauda in South Kordofan State, killing at least fifty people, almost all of them civilians, according to local groups. This Thursday, paramilitary forces killed at least nine more people, including four children, in suicide drone attacks targeting a day care center and medical center in Kadugli.
In this context, Sudanese media and human rights groups reported widespread forced recruitment campaigns, including of children, centered in South Kordofan and attributed mainly to the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North. In recent weeks, the organization has been accused on several occasions of entering villages near the front, especially at night, and forcibly recruiting at least dozens of civilians into its ranks after kidnapping or threatening them, prompting many families in the area to flee to protect their youth.
This series of atrocities comes after the Rapid Support Forces took control of El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, at the end of October. They committed widespread crimes against their own populationWhich I had previously been exposed to More than 500 days of siege. The head of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, said on Wednesday that it was “shocking to see history repeating itself in Kordofan so soon after those horrific events,” and urged the world not to allow the region “to become another El Fasher.”
The escalation of violence in this region is also causing new waves of displacement of thousands of civilians. Last month, the United Nations estimated that at least 45,000 people had to leave their homes in search of safer places inside or outside Kordofan. Local media report that many host communities are exhausted and having great difficulty accommodating the rapid influx of people amid a widespread collapse of basic infrastructure.
The intensity of the conflict in Kordofan also decreased Recent efforts by the United States and Egypt To reach a ceasefire in Sudan. At the end of November, the army commander, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, described any proposal that did not include the disarmament of the Rapid Support Forces – which the army had armed in the past – as “unacceptable,” and once again called for their withdrawal from all occupied territories. The paramilitary leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, then declared a unilateral truce, but they did not respect it at any time and his gesture was interpreted as an attempt to whitewash their image.
The collapse of these diplomatic efforts coincided with greater foreign intervention in the war, according to Egyptian media. Mada Masr. In recent weeks, Türkiye and Egypt have strengthened their coordination with the Sudanese army, including deploying Turkish drones, to attack the Rapid Support Forces’ supply lines and attempt to disrupt The great military support they receive From the United Arab Emirates via Libya and Chad, which was key to its advance in Darfur and Kordofan.