| Sudan civil war update for the week of August 10-16, 2026: the Sudanese Armed Forces consolidated a major strategic gain after retaking the Al Sadarat highway linking Khartoum to El Obeid on July 26, the Rapid Support Forces formally announced a strategic recalibration of their forces in response to SAF battlefield pressure, a senior RSF-aligned commander was killed in a drone strike in Central Darfur, and Sudan’s drone war reached its highest recorded monthly intensity with over 27 incidents documented around El Obeid in June 2026. The humanitarian situation continued to deteriorate, with famine formally declared in parts of Sudan and over 12 million people displaced in the world’s largest internal displacement crisis. Universalnest.com tracks this conflict weekly within its War and Conflict coverage across Current Affairs. |
Sudan SAF Gains This Week: Al Sadarat Highway Retaken and RSF Announces Strategic Recalibration
Sudan’s Sudanese Armed Forces retook the Al Sadarat highway on July 26, 2026, restoring a critical logistics corridor between Khartoum and El Obeid in North Kordofan and marking one of the most significant SAF territorial gains of the conflict’s fourth year, as the Rapid Support Forces responded by formally announcing a recalibration of their forces and repositioning toward supply areas closer to their western strongholds.
The Al Sadarat highway holds direct military and economic significance. El Obeid is the capital of North Kordofan and a major logistics hub; the highway is the primary overland connection between Khartoum and central Sudan. RSF interruption of this corridor had hampered SAF’s ability to resupply its Kordofan-area forces and move materiel between the capital region and the fight in central Sudan. Its recapture restores a key line of communication and reflects growing SAF momentum in this part of the country.
The SAF claimed that 240 military vehicles were wrecked and hundreds of RSF fighters were killed during the operations leading to the highway’s retaking. RSF forces did not confirm these figures. What the RSF did confirm is more significant: the formal announcement of a “recalibration” of forces, which independent analysts at Operation Broken Silence assessed in their July 31, 2026 update as a repositioning to tighter supply lines closer to the RSF’s main bases in Darfur and the west.
The strategic logic cuts both ways. SAF has long supply lines and ongoing fuel shortages that weaken its ability to sustain an advance; the RSF, by recalibrating to positions closer to its UAE-backed supply chain, reduces its own logistical exposure while the SAF attempts to maintain forward pressure in contested central Sudan.
| Development | Detail |
| Al Sadarat highway | SAF retook July 26; Khartoum-El Obeid logistics corridor restored |
| SAF claim | 240 vehicles destroyed; hundreds of RSF killed |
| RSF response | Formal recalibration announced; repositioning to tighter supply lines |
| RSF commander killed | Hamid Ali Abubakar; drone strike; Damrat al-Firdous, Central Darfur |
| RSF Baykar Akinci drone | SAF claims one shot down over Nyala Airport |
| Blue Nile front | SAF 4th Infantry Division engaged RSF-al-Hilu incursion from South Sudan |
RSF Recalibration and the Drone Strike That Killed a Senior Commander in Central Darfur
The Rapid Support Forces’ strategic recalibration coincided with the confirmed death of Hamid Ali Abubakar, the commander-in-chief of the RSF-aligned faction of the Sudanese Awakening Revolutionary Council and a concurrent security adviser to RSF leader General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, who was killed in a drone strike on a meeting of RSF and allied commanders in Damrat al-Firdous in Central Darfur.
Abubakar’s dual role made him a significant figure in the RSF’s command architecture. The Sudanese Awakening Revolutionary Council (RAC) is one of the Arab militia factions allied to the RSF that has operated in Darfur alongside RSF forces throughout the conflict. His death in what appears to have been an intelligence-led targeting of a commanders’ meeting represents the kind of command-level loss that could affect operational coordination in Darfur at a time when the RSF is simultaneously recalibrating its broader strategy.
The recalibration itself reflects three years of conflict dynamics catching up with the RSF. In 2023 and 2024, the RSF consolidated control over Khartoum, North Khartoum, and Omdurman and expanded into Gezira State, Sennar State, White Nile State, and North Kordofan. The SAF’s regaining of the Al Sadarat corridor is the most meaningful territorial counter-move since that expansion. By repositioning to core supply areas in the west and Darfur, the RSF preserves its logistics while daring the SAF to advance further along exposed supply lines.
The full history of how the SAF and RSF went from allied coup partners in October 2021 to full-scale civil war in April 2023, and how the conflict spread from Khartoum to become a nationwide emergency, is documented in the Sudan civil war history pillar on Universalnest.
Sudan’s Drone War: Record Incidents Around El Obeid, UAE and Iranian Weapons, and Civilian Targets
Sudan’s civil war has developed into one of the most drone-intensive conflicts operating anywhere in 2026, with June 2026 recording more than 27 documented drone incidents around the single city of El Obeid, the highest monthly count since the conflict began in April 2023, with both sides deploying increasingly capable systems supplied by external patrons and targeting civilian infrastructure across the country.
Both parties to the conflict have expanded their drone arsenals substantially since 2025. The SAF fields Iranian-manufactured drones, Turkish Baykar Bayraktar Akinci high-altitude long-endurance aircraft, and commercially available Chinese platforms. The RSF, which receives substantial backing from the United Arab Emirates, operates Chinese-manufactured drone systems supplied through UAE logistics channels. The SAF claimed to have shot down an RSF-operated Baykar Bayraktar Akinci over Nyala Airport in South Darfur, which would represent a significant ISR and strike capability loss for the RSF in that region.
Drone strikes across both SAF and RSF operations have targeted power infrastructure, fuel storage facilities, bridges, food markets, and hospitals. These strikes have hit populated areas in both SAF-held and RSF-held zones. Independent conflict monitoring confirmed the 27+ El Obeid figure; the previous monthly record for any single area had been significantly lower. The trajectory indicates the drone war is intensifying even as ground lines of battle shift.
Port Sudan, Sudan’s main Red Sea port and the primary humanitarian entry point for international aid, was itself struck by drone attacks in 2025. Even the logistics corridor that connects Sudan to the outside world has been targeted, compromising the delivery of food, medicine, and supplies to a population where millions face famine conditions.
| Indicator | Detail | Source |
| SAF drones | Iranian + Turkish Baykar Akinci + Chinese commercial | FDD |
| RSF drones | UAE-supplied Chinese-manufactured systems | FDD |
| June 2026 El Obeid incidents | 27+ documented — conflict record | FDD |
| Civilian targets struck | Power, fuel, bridges, markets, hospitals | FDD |
| RSF Baykar Akinci | Shot down over Nyala Airport (SAF claim) | Wikipedia |
| Port Sudan | Struck by drones in 2025; humanitarian corridor compromised | Operation Broken Silence |
Sudan Famine Risk This Week: The Hunger Emergency in a Country at War for Four Years
Sudan has become the first African country to receive a formal famine declaration in decades, with Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) Phase 5 (Famine) declared in specific areas including Zamzam camp in North Darfur, as the combination of sustained military operations, systematic looting of agricultural regions, restrictions on humanitarian access, and drone strikes on food markets and supply routes has produced one of the most severe food emergencies in the world.
Approximately 25 million people across Sudan face acute food insecurity at varying severity levels across the five IPC phases. Of these, the most critical concentration is in IPC Phase 4 (Emergency) and Phase 5 (Famine) areas. The RSF’s looting of Gezira State, one of Sudan’s most agriculturally productive regions, during 2023 and 2024 directly destroyed the food production capacity that supplied much of central Sudan. SAF airstrikes on RSF-held but civilian-populated territories have added to the hunger crisis rather than reducing it.
Aid access is governed by both parties’ willingness to permit it, and neither has consistently done so. Humanitarian workers have been killed, expelled, and prevented from operating in multiple regions. The drone war has targeted the road and fuel infrastructure that aid convoys depend on. Port Sudan, the only reliable international entry point, was itself compromised by drone attacks.
The UN has described Sudan as “the most neglected major humanitarian emergency in the world.” The formal famine declaration, the largest displacement crisis on earth, and four years of fighting have produced a situation that receives a fraction of the international attention and funding directed at conflicts with far smaller humanitarian footprints.
Sudan Refugee Crisis Developments: 12 Million Displaced and the World’s Largest Displacement Emergency
Sudan’s civil war has produced the world’s largest internal displacement crisis, with over 12 million people displaced inside Sudan and millions more who have crossed into neighbouring countries including Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic, making Sudan the single largest source of displacement of any active conflict on earth.
The displacement figure has risen consistently since April 2023. In the earlier phases of the conflict, displacement was concentrated in Khartoum and Darfur. As the RSF expanded into Gezira, Sennar, White Nile, and North Kordofan, new waves of displacement followed each advance. The SAF’s aerial bombardment of RSF-controlled areas has displaced additional populations from cities and towns where RSF control has not been militarily dislodged but has been struck from the air.
In Darfur, the displacement carries an additional dimension. RSF and allied Arab militias have conducted mass killings, sexual violence on a systematic scale, and ethnic displacement targeting non-Arab communities, particularly in West Darfur, North Darfur, and South Darfur. The UN, the United States, and several European governments have used the term genocide to describe the pattern of attacks. This ethnic dimension of the Darfur displacement is not a byproduct of military operations but appears to be a direct objective of operations in that region.
All formal peace processes have failed. The Jeddah Process, mediated by Saudi Arabia and the United States in 2023, collapsed without agreement. Subsequent mediation attempts through African Union and regional mechanisms have produced neither ceasefire nor meaningful negotiations. As of August 2026, there are no active formal negotiations between the SAF and RSF.
Sudan’s crisis stands in stark contrast in terms of international attention to the Gaza-Israel conflict tracked in Universalnest’s previous weekly update, despite Sudan producing the world’s largest displacement figure by a significant margin.
Sudan Civil War Week of August 10-16: SAF Advances, RSF Repositions, Famine Declared, No Peace in Sight
Sudan civil war developments this week confirm that the conflict is in one of its most active military and humanitarian phases since 2023. The SAF has restored a key logistics corridor and eliminated a senior RSF commander. The RSF has recalibrated without collapsing. The drone war is at record intensity. Famine has been declared. Over 12 million people are displaced with no peace process operating. Four years in, the Sudan civil war remains the world’s most neglected major conflict, producing the world’s largest displacement crisis, and its trajectory in August 2026 points toward continuation rather than resolution. Universalnest.com tracks this conflict and every major active war weekly within its War and Conflict coverage across Current Affairs.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the current status of the Sudan civil war in August 2026?
The Sudan civil war is in its fourth year. The SAF retook the Al Sadarat highway in late July 2026. The RSF has formally recalibrated its forces and repositioned. A senior RSF-aligned commander was killed in Central Darfur. Drone warfare around El Obeid reached its highest recorded monthly intensity in June 2026.
What is the RSF and who is the SAF in Sudan?
The SAF (Sudanese Armed Forces) is Sudan’s official military, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. The RSF (Rapid Support Forces) is a paramilitary force led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (Hemedti). Both jointly staged the October 2021 coup before fighting broke out between them on April 15, 2023.
Who is supplying weapons and drones to each side in Sudan?
The RSF receives drone systems from the UAE, including Chinese-manufactured platforms. The SAF uses Iranian-manufactured drones, Turkish Baykar Bayraktar Akinci aircraft, and commercially available Chinese platforms. Both sides have dramatically escalated drone use since 2025, targeting military and civilian infrastructure across Sudan.
Has famine been declared in Sudan?
Yes. IPC Phase 5 (Famine) has been formally declared in parts of Sudan, including Zamzam camp in North Darfur, making Sudan the first African country to receive an official famine declaration in decades. Approximately 25 million people face acute food insecurity at varying severity levels across Sudan.
How many people are displaced in Sudan’s civil war?
Over 12 million people are internally displaced in Sudan, making it the world’s largest internal displacement crisis. Millions more have crossed into Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic. The UN describes Sudan as the single largest source of displacement of any active conflict on earth.
What happened in Darfur during Sudan’s civil war?
RSF and allied Arab militias have conducted mass killings, systematic sexual violence, and ethnic displacement targeting non-Arab communities in Darfur. The United States and UN have used the term genocide to describe the pattern of attacks, which mirrors the 2003-2009 Darfur genocide carried out by the same RSF predecessor force (the Janjaweed).
Are there any active peace talks for Sudan’s civil war?
No. All formal peace processes have failed. The Jeddah Process (2023) mediated by Saudi Arabia and the United States collapsed without agreement. African Union and regional mediation attempts have not produced a ceasefire or negotiations. As of August 2026, there are no active formal talks between the SAF and RSF.
