RSF Seizes El Fasher: Famine, Ethnic Cleansing, and Foreign Complicity Push Sudan Toward Collapse

Executive Summary

The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) capture of El Fasher—the final Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) stronghold in Darfur—marks a decisive and catastrophic turn in Sudan’s civil war. The fall of the city has unleashed mass killings, ethnic cleansing, and mass displacement, while exposing international complicity through foreign arms transfers and proxy involvement. With over 260,000 civilians trapped and famine conditions already underway, El Fasher’s fall symbolizes not just the defeat of the army in western Sudan, but the unraveling of the Sudanese state itself.

Key Judgments

Key Judgment 1

The RSF takeover of El Fasher represents the effective military collapse of Sudan’s national army in Darfur and a de facto partition of the country.

Evidence: El Fasher, home to more than 250,000 civilians and the SAF’s 6th Infantry Division, fell to the RSF after 18 months of siege. The RSF now controls all five state capitals in Darfur, leaving SAF forces isolated in eastern Sudan (DW, UN News, Sudan’s Post).

Key Judgment 2

The RSF is conducting systematic, ethnically motivated atrocities consistent with genocide against non-Arab groups.

Evidence: The Yale Humanitarian Research Lab confirmed satellite imagery showing “door-to-door clearance operations” targeting Fur, Zaghawa, and Berti civilians. Video evidence and reports from activists document mass executions and summary killings of noncombatants (Irish Times, UNHCR, DW).

Key Judgment 3

Foreign complicity—particularly through UAE arms supplies involving British-made equipment—has materially strengthened RSF capabilities and prolonged atrocities.

Evidence: UN Security Council dossiers show UK-manufactured engines and small-arms systems recovered from RSF positions. These were originally exported to the UAE, which has been credibly accused of diverting weapons to the RSF despite ongoing embargoes (The Guardian).

Key Judgment 4

The humanitarian situation in Darfur has reached famine-like conditions, with mass displacement overwhelming aid corridors and host communities.

Evidence: UN OCHA reports more than 17.7 million Sudanese in acute food insecurity, with El Fasher civilians reportedly eating animal feed. Over 26,000 fled the city within days, while Tawila—already hosting 650,000 displaced persons—faces imminent collapse (UN News, OCHA).

Key Judgment 5

Regional rivalries and international inaction are fueling Sudan’s fragmentation and enabling war crimes with impunity.

Evidence: Egypt and Saudi Arabia back the SAF, while the UAE, Eritrea, and Ethiopia support the RSF. Russia, Iran, and Turkey have all supplied arms or drones, turning Sudan into a proxy war theater. Competing agendas have paralyzed peace talks in Jeddah and Addis Ababa (Wilson Center).

Key Judgment 6

Without decisive international intervention—especially sanctions on arms suppliers and humanitarian air corridors—Sudan risks state failure and regional destabilization.

Evidence: The RSF now governs one-third of Sudan’s territory through terror, while SAF and allied militias regroup in Port Sudan. UN agencies warn of uncontrolled refugee flows into Chad and South Sudan and the potential for famine to claim hundreds of thousands more lives by early 2026 (UNHCR, IRC).

Analysis

The capture of El Fasher by the Rapid Support Forces is the culmination of a scorched-earth campaign that began with the April 2023 war between Sudan’s rival generals: SAF commander Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (“Hemedti”). The RSF’s victory in North Darfur marks not just a territorial gain but a genocidal conquest aimed at erasing non-Arab communities and consolidating control over western Sudan.

For 18 months, El Fasher endured siege warfare characterized by starvation tactics, indiscriminate shelling, and a total blockade of communications and aid. By late October 2025, satellite imagery and witness accounts confirmed mass executions, ethnic cleansing, and forced displacement. Entire neighborhoods of Fur, Zaghawa, and Berti civilians were systematically cleared, their homes looted or burned. Humanitarian corridors remain closed, and UN officials describe civilians as “trapped, starving, and terrified.”

The RSF’s campaign follows the same pattern as its predecessors—the Janjaweed militias of the 2003 Darfur genocide—employing rape, famine, and terror as instruments of control. The group’s fighters, many reportedly child soldiers and narcotics-dependent combatants, have institutionalized mass sexual violence and executions to demoralize resistance. Their victory has already triggered calls from Darfur Governor Minni Arko Minnawi for “mass mobilization inside and outside Sudan” to resist what he termed “genocide and demographic replacement.”

Yet the RSF’s battlefield success is inseparable from foreign support. UN Security Council evidence confirms that UK-manufactured engines and training devices exported to the UAE ended up in RSF hands—underscoring systemic failures in arms export oversight. The UAE’s role as chief supplier of RSF weaponry, facilitated through Chadian air corridors, has drawn international scrutiny but no sanctions. Meanwhile, the SAF’s backers—Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Iran—have provided drones, air support, and logistics to counterbalance RSF dominance, making Sudan’s war a regional proxy conflict between Gulf and African powers.

The humanitarian consequences are staggering. Nearly 18 million Sudanese now face acute hunger, with 4.9 million on the brink of famine. Over 12 million have fled their homes, creating the world’s largest displacement crisis. Disease outbreaks, sexual violence, and malnutrition are surging across Darfur, Kordofan, and Gedaref. In El Fasher, local aid workers report an average of three child deaths per hour due to hunger and untreated illness.

Diplomatically, the international community remains paralyzed. The U.S. and EU have issued statements but no coordinated sanctions regime. The African Union’s mediation efforts have failed amid mutual accusations of bias. The UN Security Council’s divisions—fueled by Russian and Chinese reluctance to isolate the RSF—have prevented an arms embargo or humanitarian airlift authorization.

Strategically, Sudan’s collapse threatens to destabilize the entire Sahel and Horn of Africa. Arms and fighters flow across porous borders into Chad, Libya, and South Sudan. The RSF’s control of Darfur’s gold mines gives it financial independence and the means to entrench its rule, while the SAF’s retreat to Port Sudan signals a bifurcation of the state. Unless external actors impose meaningful costs on both sides—beginning with sanctioning Emirati arms transfers and opening humanitarian corridors—Sudan risks fragmenting into rival warlord territories akin to Libya or Yemen.

El Fasher’s fall is therefore more than a humanitarian tragedy—it is a geopolitical inflection point. The RSF’s ascent, facilitated by foreign complicity and global indifference, is reshaping the regional balance of power. For intelligence and security professionals, it offers a grim lesson: unchecked proxy warfare and permissive arms transfers can transform fragile states into epicenters of famine, terror, and strategic chaos.

Sources

• DW – “Sudan: After RSF takeover, atrocities feared in Darfur”

• The Guardian – “UK military equipment used by militia accused of genocide found in Sudan, UN told”

• UN News – “‘Horrific’ violence as thousands flee Sudan’s El Fasher”

• Sudan’s Post – “Minnawi calls for mass mobilization after fall of El-Fasher”

• Irish Times – “Ethnically motivated mass killings reported in Sudanese city seized by paramilitary group”

• Semper Incolumem – “Drone Strike on Sudan Mosque Kills 75+, International Condemnation Mounts”

• UN OCHA – “Sudan: One Year of Conflict – Key Facts and Figures”

• Wilson Center – “Conflict in Sudan: A Map of Regional and International Actors”