‘The situation is terrible’: aid workers on life in Sudanese city pummelled by drone strikes | Sudan
Fatima lost track of the number of drone attacks on the besieged Sudanese city of Al Obeid, but said last weekend’s attacks were the most severe yet.
He said that drones hit schools and fuel stations, and more than 20 people, including students, died. “In the past few months it has become the norm to see 40 or 45 drones. You can actually count them,” said the aid volunteer, whose name has been changed for fear of retaliation.
Al Obeid, a city of half a million people, is a key battleground in the war between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Attacks carried out by RSF have led the UN and other organizations to warn of the risk of atrocities.
Located between RSF-held areas in the West Darfur region and army-controlled areas in the east, Al Obeid has been subjected to repeated drone attacks on its infrastructure. The army is fighting to prevent the paramilitary group from establishing a new blockade following a siege in February last year.
According to the UN human rights office, at least 45 people were killed and 41 others were injured in 15 drone attacks in the city and surrounding areas from June 6 to June 28. Fears are growing of a repeat of last year’s massacre in the city of El Fasher, when RSF fighters launched a major offensive after capturing the city following an 18-month siege.
Amnesty International published a report on Wednesday saying RSF had committed ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity during its campaign to capture El Fasher. An independent fact-finding mission for the UN had already said that RSF’s capture of the city showed that: “distinguishing features of genocideagainst non-Arab communities.
On Friday, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk addressed delegates in Geneva during an urgent debate of the UN Human Rights Council, called by the UK and supported by Germany, Ireland, Norway and the Netherlands.
He said: “The signs from Al Obeid are clear and unmistakable: Another human rights disaster is brewing in Sudan.
“This is not an exercise. This is a red alert that needs to land on the desks of heads of state and government around the world. Their phones will start heating up in the coming days and weeks with ideas on how to prevent atrocity crimes in El Obeid and elsewhere in Kordofan.”
El Obeid hosts an SAF infantry division and an air base, as well as approximately 100,000 refugees displaced by the violence.
Experts emphasized the significant concentration of RSF troops around the city and warned of an imminent ground attack. a report The report, released Monday by the Yale Laboratory for Humane Research, found damage “consistent with the intentional bombing of civilian infrastructure essential to sustaining life” at electricity generation, fuel storage facilities and the main market.
The report also said the increase in internally displaced persons camps in Al Obeid, to more than 700 temporary structures in one month, was “consistent with the influx of highly vulnerable civilian populations into the city.”
He said the SAF had built defensive positions of about 30 miles (50 km); This shows that he expects a siege.
Nohad Eltayeb, senior research fellow at conflict monitoring group Acled. in question Last month, 27 drone attacks were recorded around Al Obeid; this was the highest monthly total since the conflict began in 2023.
In her audio diary for the human rights advocacy group Avaaz, Fatima spoke of living life on the edge due to drone attacks on hospitals, gas stations and other facilities. It was stated that the city’s main power plant was hit in the attack last week, causing power outages in most of the city. He added that drones also hit people who had gathered to share Starlink internet connections when telecommunications networks went down.
“I can’t tell you how terrible the situation is right now,” Fatima said. “Even the way people speak at funerals is different. Instead of praying for the dead, they talk about how they died.”
According to Fatima, traders increased prices by saying their goods were being targeted by drones or looted on their way to El Obeid from other parts of the country.
Ahlam, a humanitarian aid worker whose name has also been changed, said residents had become accustomed to the pain, loss and fear caused by constant drone attacks. “Almost every essential service and piece of critical infrastructure has been hit in the last two weeks alone,” he said.
He added that some people were considering leaving the city, but attacks on gas stations had increased prices and made transportation much more expensive. Stating that there are already many displaced people in the city, he fears that if the conflict escalates, it will have devastating consequences.
Will Davies, Avaaz’s Sudan director, said the drone strikes had created an “extremely dire” situation in Al Obeid. He said the city lacked the ethnic dynamics that factored into the Al Fasher killings and that a major ground offensive was unlikely because “there is no evidence of a large enough force to do it.”
Mohamed Badawi, director of the African Center for Justice and Peace Research, called for a ceasefire and called on the international community to pressure the creation of safe corridors for people to flee El Obeid.
The war began in April 2023, when a power struggle between the SAF, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the RSF, led by General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, turned violent in the capital, Khartoum.
conflict killed hundreds of thousands Many people were displaced and many more were displaced. It is fueled by foreign powers with interests that support the parties to the conflict.
On Monday, the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights and a coalition of civil organizations Citing senior officials in the UAE, Iran, Türkiye and Egypt He applied to the international criminal court for “aiding and abetting atrocity crimes” in Darfur. They accused them of providing weapons, mercenaries, equipment, financing and logistical support.
