Genocide in Sudan: Civil war between radical Islamist SAF and RSF has resulted in a dire crisis for Christian minorities, thousands killed and starved while the world ignores
Sudan’s ongoing civil war has taken a horrific turn, with new reports of mass killings and ethnic violence emerging from the Darfur region. El-Fasher fell on Sunday, 26th October, after 18 months of RSF seize, which blocked the entry of food and essentials for thousands of people trapped inside.
The brutal conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has left more than two thousand dead, millions displaced, and entire communities wiped out by Friday, 31st October.
For over 18 months, El-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, had been under siege by the RSF, a powerful paramilitary group that grew out of the notorious Janjaweed militias responsible for the early 2000s Darfur genocide. El Fasher was the last remaining stronghold of the Sudanese Armed Forces. When the city finally fell, the violence that followed mirrored the same atrocities that shocked the world two decades ago.
1.2 million people in the city had been under siege for 18 months, forced to survive on animal feed, or worse, as the RSF built 56km (35-mile) of barriers, preventing entry of food and medicine and sealing off escape routes.
An analysis by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) appeared to confirm reports of mass killings, using satellite imagery and remote-sensing data.
According to the HRL, clusters of objects and ground discolouration are evidence of human bodies and pools of blood. The clusters and discolouration were not present in images taken before the RSF invaded, the report noted.
More than 26,000 people have fled el-Fasher in just two days, most on foot towards Tawila, 70km (43 miles) to the west, the UN said. Some 177,000 civilians remain trapped in El-Fasher, according to the International Organisation for Migration.
A report earlier this month stated that as many as 14 million people have been displaced, calling the Sudan civil war the worst displacement crisis in the world currently.
Image via Aljazeera
The RSF fighters themselves have posted videos online, showing civilians, mostly men and boys, being executed, beaten, and mocked. The footage, which has spread across social media, has been verified by multiple human rights investigators.
According to the Yale report, El-Fasher “appears to be undergoing a systematic and intentional process of ethnic cleansing of indigenous non-Arab communities through forced displacement and execution.”
The RSF denies accusations of genocide, but even its leader, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as “Hemedti,” admitted that his forces had committed “violations.” He released a video expressing “regret” for what had happened and announced the arrest of one RSF fighter, a move international observers dismissed as symbolic.
The roots of Sudan’s endless war
Sudan has a long and painful history. Since gaining independence in 1956, after nearly six decades of British Egyptian rule, Sudan has endured a succession of devastating wars in its southern, western, and eastern regions. According to United Nations estimates, the civil war in South Sudan claimed around two million lives before the region’s succession in 2011. In western Sudan, the Darfur conflict left more than 300,000 people dead between 2003 and 2019.
Sudan conflict map by Visual Capitalist. Link: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/map-explainer-sudan/
Even before the current war, recurring tribal and regional clashes had already exacted a heavy toll, killing over 250,000 people. Today’s conflict has only deepened this national tragedy. More than 150,000 people have been killed and millions have been displaced, and countless civilians subjected to grave abuses, including extrajudicial killings, arbitrary detentions, sexual violence, and widespread looting.
The war has also brought agricultural and industrial activity to a standstill, driven nearly 19 million children out of school, destroyed critical infrastructure, and caused the Sudanese currency to collapse to unprecedented levels.
By 2023, their rivalry had exploded into open warfare. Since then, at least 15,000 people have been killed in major massacres, including one in El-Geneina, where RSF forces wiped out members of the Masalit tribe.
Bloodbath visible from space: A nation drenched in violence
What makes the current conflict even more shocking is its scale and savagery. Satellite imagery from several humanitarian organisations has shown bloodstained terrain, destroyed villages, and mass graves so large that they are visible from space.
The RSF’s campaign follows a clear and horrifying pattern: surround a city, cut off food and medicine, block electricity and communication, and then attack once the population is weakened. “They are using starvation and terror as weapons of war,” said Claire Ferguson, a researcher documenting atrocities in Darfur.
Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has reported entire communities being wiped out, especially in camps for displaced people like Zamzam near El-Fasher, and rampant sexual violence against women. Survivors say RSF fighters deliberately targeted civilians belonging to the Zaghawa ethnic group, seeing them as supporters of the army.
But atrocities have not been limited to the RSF. The SAF, which controls parts of eastern and central Sudan, has also been accused of bombing civilian areas indiscriminately, particularly in Sennar, Gezira, and North Kordofan states. Human rights groups say both sides have committed war crimes, including extrajudicial killings, torture, and sexual violence.
Christians caught between two Islamist factions
Sudan is a predominantly Muslim country, with around 90% of its population adhering to Islam. Christians, who make up a small minority, have long faced persecution, discrimination, and a lack of political power. With the civil war now raging between two Islamist factions, both influenced by radical ideologies, Christian minorities have become even more vulnerable.
While most of the victims of the war are Muslims, Christian communities have been through unspeakable horrors, caught in the crossfire. Most live in abject poverty and have little to no access to political or legal protection. Churches have been destroyed, pastors arrested, and aid workers targeted. In areas controlled by the RSF, Christian families have reported being forced to flee or convert under threat of violence.
Sudan’s long history of religious persecution dates back to Omar al-Bashir’s dictatorship, which imposed strict Islamic laws and banned the open practice of Christianity. Even after Bashir’s fall, the system that marginalised Christians remained in place. Today, with both the SAF and RSF claiming to defend Islam, Christian minorities find themselves trapped between two forces that view them with suspicion or outright hostility.
“The Christians of Sudan have no voice,” said a Khartoum-based pastor who fled to South Sudan earlier this year. “They are killed, starved, and forgotten. The world looks at Sudan and sees a Muslim war, but it is also a war on Christians.”
The UAE’s shadow over Sudan’s war
While Sudan bleeds, powerful foreign interests are accused of fueling the fire. A recent UN report and several independent investigations have stated that some powerful elements in the UAE are providing financial, logistical, and military support to the RSF.
The UAE’s motivation is largely economic and strategic. Despite being a wealthy Gulf nation, the UAE lacks its own gold reserves, and Sudan, particularly Darfur, is rich in gold. Hemedti’s RSF controls many of these gold mines and sells the metal primarily to Emirati buyers. In return, the UAE has supplied the RSF with weapons, drones, and ammunition, often disguised as “humanitarian aid.”
According to reports, the UAE has also allowed the RSF to operate businesses, financial fronts, and propaganda campaigns from its territory. Injured RSF fighters are reportedly flown to Abu Dhabi for treatment in military hospitals. Even Hemedti himself has been seen travelling in an Emirati royal’s private jet for diplomatic visits to African nations.
According to The Africa Report, Sudan exports approximately $16 billion worth of gold to the UAE annually, with a substantial portion originating from Darfur mines seized by the RSF since 2017. Most of these mines use illegal mining practices, and much of the gold is illicitly smuggled out of Darfur.
“Without UAE support, the RSF would not have been able to wage war at this scale,” said a UN analyst familiar with the investigation. “They are bankrolling a genocide.”
The UAE has denied these allegations, but Western diplomats and human rights groups remain unconvinced.
A humanitarian disaster ignored by the world
The war in Sudan has created one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Millions of people have been internally displaced, while 2 million have fled the country. Nearly half of Sudan’s population, around 25 million people, now needs humanitarian aid. Yet, according to the UN, only 12% of the $2.7 billion in requested aid has been funded.
Famine, disease, and violence are spreading rapidly. Entire towns have been burned to the ground. Aid workers have been killed. Relief convoys have been looted. The fighting for El-Fasher, in particular, has trapped hundreds of thousands of civilians with no food or clean water.
Meanwhile, international peace efforts have failed. Talks hosted in Jeddah by the US and Saudi Arabia in 2023 produced a “declaration to protect civilians,” but both the SAF and RSF violated it almost immediately. The UN, the African Union, and the European Union have condemned the atrocities but stopped short of concrete intervention.
Observers warn that unless the flow of weapons is stopped, Sudan could fall into permanent chaos, a failed state controlled by warlords and militias.
A country bleeding from its past
Sudan’s tragedy is not just about two generals fighting for power, it is the legacy of decades of dictatorship, inequality, and foreign exploitation. From the Darfur genocide to today’s war, the victims have largely been the same: poor, marginalised people with no voice.
Christians, ethnic minorities, and civilians who simply want peace are paying the price for a conflict they did not start. With both the SAF and RSF using religion and ethnicity as weapons, and powerful businesses profiting from the bloodshed, Sudan’s future looks increasingly uncertain.
Another disturbing aspect of these ongoing human tragedy is that most of the world has been aloof. While the news media is occupied with ‘All Eyes on Gaza’ and geopolitical tensions around the war in Ukraine, the suffering of millions of impoverished, helpless people in Sudan has been largely ignored.
As the world’s attention drifts elsewhere, the genocide in Sudan continues, visible from space, but ignored on Earth.
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