Sudan paramilitary kills 40 in Darfur camp – rescuers

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacked a famine-hit refugee camp in Darfur on Monday, killing at least 40 civilians and injuring 19 others, rescuers said. The RSF stormed Abu Shouk, opening fire inside homes and on the streets, the local Emergency Response Room said, reporting “more than 40 civilians” dead at the camp north […]

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacked a famine-hit refugee camp in Darfur on Monday, killing at least 40 civilians and injuring 19 others, rescuers said.

The RSF stormed Abu Shouk, opening fire inside homes and on the streets, the local Emergency Response Room said, reporting “more than 40 civilians” dead at the camp north of El-Fasher – the last city in the western Darfur region still held by the Sudanese army, at war with the paramilitary group since April 2023.

In recent months, North Darfur state capital El-Fasher and nearby displacement camps have come under renewed attacks by the RSF, after the group withdrew from Sudan’s capital Khartoum earlier this year.

A major RSF offensive in April on Zamzam, a nearby displacement camp, forced tens of thousands of people to flee again, with many of them now sheltering inside El-Fasher.

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The RSF controls nearly all of Darfur and, with its allies, parts of Sudan’s south, while the army dominates the country’s north, east and centre.

The war, now in its third year, has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and created what the United Nations describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis.

Last year, famine was declared in three camps around El-Fasher, including Abu Shouk, and the United Nations had estimated it would spread to the city itself by last May.

A lack of data has prevented an official famine declaration.

This week alone, malnutrition has killed at least 63 people in El-Fasher, mostly women and children, a senior health official told AFP.

Many families are unable to reach hospitals due to insecurity and lack of transport, choosing instead to bury loved ones quietly.

At a community kitchen in El-Fasher, organisers have said some of the children and women they serve arrive there with swollen bellies, sunken eyes and signs of acute malnutrition.

Abu Shouk community leader Adam Essa told AFP on Sunday that the camp has seen between five and seven child deaths daily.

Across Sudan, nearly 25 million people are suffering dire food insecurity, according to UN figures.