Amnesty International has leveled grave charges against Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), alleging that the group perpetrated horrific El-Fasher atrocities, including ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity, during its brutal assault on the key city between 2024 and 2025. This bombshell report, released Wednesday, meticulously details a campaign of terror that engulfed the capital of North Darfur State, leaving an indelible stain on humanity.
The human rights watchdog documented how civilians in and around El-Fasher endured an agonizing ordeal, suffering systematic killings, grievous injuries, brutal beatings, unspeakable torture, and arbitrary detentions for nearly two years. The comprehensive report paints a chilling picture of calculated cruelty, listing crimes such as murder, forced displacement, imprisonment, sexual violence including rape and sexual slavery, enslavement, extermination, and relentless persecution.
Unveiling the Horrific El-Fasher Atrocities
Hundreds of thousands of children, the most vulnerable, were forcibly displaced, many repeatedly risking their lives while fleeing. Countless others became orphans overnight. People with disabilities and the elderly faced compounded risks, confronting targeted attacks, abandonment, and heartbreaking exclusion from vital assistance. These harrowing details underscore the profound depth of the El-Fasher atrocities, a stark reminder of humanity’s capacity for cruelty.
Amnesty specifically highlighted the RSF’s relentless assaults on villages and towns surrounding El-Fasher, areas predominantly inhabited by the Zaghawa ethnic group. This focus on specific communities strongly underpins the allegations of ethnic cleansing, transforming the conflict from mere warfare into a targeted campaign of eradication. Sudan has been embroiled since April 2023 in a devastating conflict between the army and the RSF, a war that has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced an staggering 14 million people, according to the United Nations. Both factions stand accused of egregious human rights violations; indeed, a UN independent fact-finding mission in February concluded that the 2025 assault on El-Fasher bore the unmistakable “hallmarks of genocide.”
The report’s findings are built upon extensive interviews with 246 individuals, including 208 survivors – 169 adults and 39 children – who bravely recounted their direct experiences and observations of conflict-related abuses. Following the RSF’s final offensive on El-Fasher on October 26, 2025, investigators found evidence of hundreds of civilians executed, with many more subjected to torture and illegal detention. One 58-year-old woman survivor recounted seeing nearly 1,000 dead bodies, among them innocent children.
The city of El-Fasher endured a brutal siege by the RSF from May 2024 to October 2025, during which food supplies and humanitarian aid were severely restricted, and daily shelling became a terrifying norm. This prolonged blockade engineered a catastrophic famine, forcing desperate residents to consume ambaz, a peanut oil byproduct typically reserved for animal feed. Agnes Callamard, Secretary-General of Amnesty International, vehemently declared this conflict a “war on civilians.”
“The world was explicitly warned of the horrors confronting civilians in El-Fasher as the RSF tightened its siege. It is an enduring stain on the conscience of humanity,” Callamard stated, her voice resonating with urgency. She concluded with a powerful plea: “A nationwide ceasefire is an immediate imperative. An independent, adequately resourced international force must be deployed to Sudan without delay to safeguard civilians against crimes committed by all parties to this conflict. Without swift, decisive action from the international community, these attacks on civilians – and the immense suffering and trauma inflicted upon children – will tragically continue unhindered.” Learn more about the principles of international justice and human rights advocacy.
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