A major human rights organization has levelled serious accusations against Sudan’s paramilitary force, claiming it committed war crimes during an assault earlier this year on the country’s largest displacement camp in Darfur.
The Rapid Support Forces, locked in a brutal conflict with Sudan’s military, stormed Zamzam camp in April while tightening their siege on the city of el-Fasher, North Darfur’s capital.
The group later captured the city in October, a takeover marked by reported executions, sexual violence, and widespread abuses.
According to Amnesty International, the Zamzam attack lasted several days and was marked by the killing of civilians, taking hostages, and the destruction of schools, mosques, and medical facilities, acts the group insists require full investigation as war crimes.
“The RSF’s horrific and deliberate assault on desperate, hungry civilians in Zamzam camp laid bare once again its alarming disregard for human life,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary-general.
This report adds to a growing list of findings by rights groups accusing the RSF of atrocities throughout Sudan’s 30-month conflict. Repeated accounts have detailed mass killings and rape during assaults on communities across Darfur. Sudan’s military has also been accused of serious abuses during the war.
The fighting between the army and RSF began in April 2023 as a power struggle spiraled into nationwide violence. The conflict has killed an estimated 40,000 people, though monitors believe the real toll may be far higher and has triggered what experts call the world’s worst humanitarian disaster, displacing over 14 million people.
Famine has taken hold in several regions, including Zamzam camp, where thousands already faced starvation before the assault.
