At least 80 people have been killed in an attack by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on a village in central Sudan’s Sinnar state.
The Sinnar Youth Gathering said in a statement that the RSF carried out the brutal attack on friday Jalkani village in Abu Hujar area of Sinnar state after a five-day siege.
According to the statement, the RSF launched the attack when the locals resisted the attempt to abduct the girls from the village. RSF militia opened fire indiscriminately in response to local resistance. They also attacked houses.
No comment has yet been received from RSF in this incident.
Since June, the RSF has taken control of large swathes of Sinna, including Singa, the state capital. The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) control the country’s eastern Sinna region.
According to the International Organization for Migration, more than 725,000 people have been displaced by the fighting in Sinna state.
Since April 15, 2023, a deadly conflict between the SAF and the RSF has been ongoing in Sudan, resulting in the loss of at least 16,650 lives.
According to recent UN data, an estimated 10.7 million people are now internally displaced in Sudan. Among them, about 2.2 million people have taken refuge in neighboring countries.
Witnesses said the Rapid Support Forces initially faced resistance from villagers in Jalgini in Sennar state. “They opened fire, torching homes and killing numerous people,” one man said. “On Friday, some bodies were still strewn on the street.”
Jalgini’s medical centre said: “We received 55 dead and dozens of wounded at the hospital on Friday and 25 of them died on Friday, bringing the death toll to 80.”
The war between Sudan’s regular army led by Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and paramilitaries led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo has killed an estimated 150,000 people, displaced more than 10 million and pushed the country to the brink of famine. Both sides have been accused of war crimes, including deliberately targeting civilians and blocking humanitarian aid.
Paramilitary delegates are attending a peace conference that began this week in Switzerland co-hosted by Saudi Arabia and the US. The Sudanese army and government have refused to take part.
US envoy Tom Perriello said the talks were having some success, simply by drawing international focus on Sudan at a time “when the world was turning its attention away.”
