Mass killings reported after paramilitaries seize Sudanese city, witnesses say

Hundreds of civilians and unarmed combatants were executed or captured as a major city was taken over by paramilitaries.

Activists and analysts have long warned of ethnic revenge killings by the paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF) if they take al-Fashir – the Sudanese army’s last stronghold in Darfur.

The UN human rights office shared other accounts on Friday, estimating that hundreds of civilians and unarmed fighters may have been executed. Such killings are considered war crimes.

RSF, whose victory in al-Fashir marks a milestone in Sudan’s two-and-a-half-year civil war, has denied such abuses – saying the accounts have been fabricated by its enemies and issuing counter-allegations against them.

Read also: Pak urges UNSC to take action

Hundreds of people who fled violence in El Fasher, the capital of western Sudan’s North Darfur state, have arrived in the northern state of Sudan after a “difficult and dangerous journey”, a local medical group said on Saturday.

Displaced families fled “massacres” by the paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF) in El Fasher and reached the Al Daba district, the Sudan Doctors Network said in a post on US social media company X.

He warned that the new arrivals were living in “deplorable humanitarian conditions”, with inadequate shelter, severe shortages of food and clean water and a lack of basic health services, particularly affecting children, women and the elderly.

“These families are now facing serious livelihood challenges beyond the capacity of the host communities to cope,” the network said, warning that the number of displaced people is expected to rise sharply in the coming days as the situation in Darfur continues to deteriorate.

Displaced Sudanese gather and sit in makeshift tents after fleeing the town of Al-Fashir in Darfur, Tawila, Sudan, on October 29, 2025, in this still image taken from Reuters video. PHOTO: REUTERS

He called on local authorities and humanitarian groups “inside and outside Sudan” to urgently provide medical aid, food, shelter and psychological support to prevent “a total collapse of the humanitarian situation”.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Friday that more than 62,000 people have been displaced from El Fasher in the four days since the Rapid RSF took control of the city.

El Fasher fell under RSF control earlier this week after a months-long siege. Human rights groups have accused the paramilitary group of mass killings, detaining people and attacking hospitals.

Sudan has been ravaged by a civil war between the army and the RSF since April 2023, causing thousands of deaths and the displacement of millions of people.

“Apocalyptic Situation”

The foreign ministers of the United Kingdom, Germany and Jordan jointly called on Saturday for an immediate ceasefire in Sudan following reports of atrocities and human rights abuses in the country’s Darfur region.

Speaking at a security meeting in Bahrain’s capital, Manama, the ministers condemned what they described as “appalling” violence perpetrated by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the city of El Fasher.

The statement comes as the United Nations warns that the RSF has rampaged through El-Fasher, killing hundreds of civilians and carrying out ethnically targeted attacks.

A member of Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF), which has been fighting the country’s army since last April. PHOTO: REUTERS

Officials say more than 450 people have been killed in hospital, and there are reports of mass executions and sexual violence.

RSF has denied killing people at the hospital. But satellite images, videos shared on social media and accounts from those who fled the city suggest widespread violence and destruction.

At the Manama Dialogue security summit, UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper described the situation as a “humanitarian crisis and catastrophic conflict” that the international community has not dealt with.

“As much as a combination of leadership and international cooperation has made progress in Gaza, it is currently failing to address the humanitarian crisis and the devastating conflict in Sudan, because the reports from Darfur in recent days are of truly horrific atrocities,” Cooper said.

“Mass executions, starvation and the devastating use of rape as a weapon of war, with women and children bearing the brunt of the greatest humanitarian crisis of the 21st century.

“No amount of aid can solve a crisis of this magnitude until the guns fall silent,” he added.

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul echoed Cooper’s warning, describing the situation in Sudan as “absolutely an apocalyptic situation”.

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said Sudan had not received “the attention it deserves”, calling the crisis “of inhumane proportions”.

“We have to stop this,” he said.

Since April 15, 2023, the Sudanese army and the RSF have been locked in a war that several regional and international mediations have failed to end. The conflict has killed an estimated 20,000 people and displaced more than 15 million as refugees and internally displaced people, according to UN reports and local reports.