Sudan activists blame notorious group for Omdurman attack in which at least 30 people killed

CAIRO -- Sudan’s notorious paramilitary group killed at least 30 people in an attack on Omdurman, the sister city of the capital, Khartoum, the authorities and an activist group said on Monday.

Rapid Support Forces are alleged to have kidnapped dozens of people, including women, from Salha, an area in the southern part of Omdurman on Sunday morning, according to the Resistance Committees activist group. It is the latest incident in a series of deadly attacks by the group this month.

Footage circulated online showed fighters wearing RSF uniforms holding dozens of men — some half-naked — in an open area, with bodies lying on the ground.

In a statement, the RSF didn’t deny the killing, but sought to distance itself from the perpetrators, saying those who appeared in the footage “are not affiliated with our forces in any way whatsoever.”

The Sudan War Monitor, an online group tracking the conflict, said it geolocated the video footage to about five kilometers (three miles) south of Omdurman Islamic University, which remains a frontline area controlled by the RSF.

The foreign ministry on Monday condemned the attacks and called for the international community to declare the RSF as a terrorist organisation.

“This heinous crime, and the militia’s rhetoric about it, which reflects its contempt for human values, leave no justification for not branding the militia as a terrorist group,” a ministry statement said.

The military has regained control of most of the northern and western areas of Omdurman as part of its sweeping advances in recent months in Khartoum and other urban areas. The RSF still has pockets in the southern part of Omdurman.

The attack was the latest in Sudan’s ongoing war which broke out in April 2023 after simmering tensions between the military and the RSF exploded into open warfare across the country.

Since then, at least 24,000 people have been killed, though the number is likely far higher. The war has driven about 13 million people from their homes, including four million crossed into neighboring countries. It also pushed parts of the country into famine.

The fighting has been marked by atrocities including mass rape and ethnically motivated killings that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity, especially in Darfur, according to the U.N. and international rights groups.

Earlier this month, the RSF and its allied militias launched a major multi-day attack on the city of el-Fasher and the Zamzam and Abu Shouk camps for displaced people in North Darfur province, killing more than than 400 people, according to the United Nations.