| The Sudan Civil War began on April 15, 2023, when the Rapid Support Forces attacked Sudanese Armed Forces bases across Khartoum, Darfur, and northern Sudan, ending a decade-long alliance between two rival generals. The RSF traces its origins to the Janjaweed militias that carried out the Darfur genocide of 2003, killing up to 300,000 people, before al-Bashir formalised them as a state paramilitary in 2013. Estimated deaths in the current war range from 150,000 to 400,000. As of April 2026, 14 million people are displaced and the IPC has confirmed famine in seven areas. RSF forces are encircling El Obeid with over half a million displaced civilians inside the city. |
The Sudan Civil War is an armed conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), commanded by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), commanded by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo known as Hemedti, which began on April 15, 2023, and has killed between 150,000 and 400,000 people. This record, maintained by Universalnest as part of its War and Conflict coverage, traces the conflict’s full arc: the 2003 Darfur genocide that gave birth to the RSF, the coups of 2019 and 2021 that placed two rival generals at Sudan’s helm, the integration deadlock that started the war, and the military and humanitarian situation as of July 2026.
Sudan Civil War: Two Former Allies, One Power Struggle, and a Death Toll Estimated at 150,000 to 400,000 People
The Sudan Civil War is a power struggle between two military factions that were once allies, which erupted on April 15, 2023, when Rapid Support Forces attacked Sudanese Armed Forces bases simultaneously across Khartoum, Darfur, and Merowe, triggering what the United Nations has identified as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
Unlike most modern armed conflicts, this war has no external aggressor at its origin. Both the SAF and RSF are Sudanese military entities. General al-Burhan commands Sudan’s internationally recognised national military. General Hemedti commands the RSF, an independent paramilitary that operated alongside the SAF for nearly a decade before turning against it. Both men governed Sudan jointly from 2021 until April 2023.
ACLED recorded over 58,000 reported fatalities by May 2024, a figure independent analysts consider a significant undercount. Le Monde and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine place the total at 150,000 to 400,000 when deaths from violence, starvation, and disease are counted together.
| Fact | Figure | Source |
| Conflict start date | April 15, 2023 | UN, CFR |
| Estimated death toll | 150,000 to 400,000 | Le Monde, LSHTM, CSIS |
| ACLED tracked fatalities | 58,000+ reported | ACLED, May 2024 |
| Civilian drone deaths 2026 | 1,000+ in first 5 months | UN High Commissioner Türk |
| Total displaced | 14 million | UNHCR, April 2026 |
| Facing acute hunger | Nearly 20 million | UN OCHA, 2026 |
| IPC famine confirmed areas | 7 | IPC, mid-2026 |
From Janjaweed to RSF: How Sudan’s Paramilitary Was Built on Darfur’s Ruins
The Rapid Support Forces were formally organised in 2013 by President Omar al-Bashir from the Janjaweed Arab militias that had carried out scorched-earth attacks against non-Arab communities across Darfur between 2003 and 2008, placing them under General Hemedti’s command and granting them official state status while preserving the ethnic targeting structures the International Criminal Court later classified as genocide.
The story begins in 2003, when non-Arab rebel groups in Darfur launched an insurgency against Khartoum. Al-Bashir mobilised the Janjaweed, loosely organised Arab nomadic militias from Darfur and the Chad-Sudan border region, and directed them against the civilian population. Janjaweed fighters arrived on horseback and in vehicles after SAF aerial strikes, burning villages, killing men and boys, and committing mass rape against women and girls from the Fur, Masalit, and Zaghawa communities.
By 2013, al-Bashir had formalised surviving Janjaweed commanders into the RSF under the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS), with Hemedti appointed overall commander. The RSF received legal status, a salary structure, and gold mines in northern Darfur as patronage. Deployment orders extended to the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen from 2015. Through gold mining and income from foreign mercenaries, Hemedti built a financial network independent of the Sudanese state treasury, which would later sustain the RSF’s ability to fight the national army without state funding.
The 2019 Revolution, the 2021 Coup, and the Road to War
The Sudan Civil War was made possible by two political events that placed the SAF and RSF in a shared power arrangement before their alliance collapsed: the April 2019 popular revolution that ousted al-Bashir with joint SAF-RSF participation, and the October 2021 coup in which both generals jointly overthrew the civilian transitional government they had committed to protect.
Mass protests spread across Sudan from late 2018, driven by rising prices, economic collapse, and three decades of al-Bashir’s rule. On April 11, 2019, al-Burhan and Hemedti coordinated the arrest of al-Bashir. The Transitional Sovereignty Council that followed gave al-Burhan the chairmanship and Hemedti the deputy position, alongside civilian representatives and a civilian Prime Minister, Abdalla Hamdok.
In October 2021, both generals staged a coup against Hamdok’s government, suspended the transitional constitution, and consolidated military control. The IMF and World Bank suspended aid and debt relief in response.
The fault line was integration. A December 2022 framework agreement required the RSF to be absorbed into the SAF over a defined timeline. The SAF demanded a two-year process. The RSF demanded ten years. Both generals understood what integration meant: the loser would forfeit independent command, gold mine revenue, and independent political standing.
April 15, 2023: What Triggered the SAF-RSF War?
The Sudan Civil War began when RSF fighters launched coordinated attacks on SAF air force bases, army headquarters, and government buildings across Khartoum on April 15, 2023, following weeks in which both sides had deployed armed forces around the capital in what each described as a defensive posture and the other characterised as preparation for aggression.
In the weeks before the outbreak, RSF fighters had redeployed from Sudan’s provinces into Khartoum in numbers that alarmed SAF commanders. On April 13, the SAF declared these RSF movements illegal. On April 14, RSF forces moved toward the Soba military base south of Khartoum. On the morning of April 15, RSF units attacked simultaneously at the SAF general command headquarters, the Khartoum air force base, and Sudan TV, the national broadcaster.
Both sides blamed the other for firing the first shot, a dispute no independent investigation has resolved. Within hours, fighting spread to Omdurman, Bahri, Merowe, and across Darfur. The speed at which violence reached Darfur reflected the RSF’s existing dominance in that region since 2013.
Darfur Atrocities: The 2003 Genocide and the RSF’s Current Pattern
Darfur has experienced two mass atrocity campaigns in 22 years: the 2003 to 2004 Janjaweed campaign that killed up to 300,000 people and displaced 2.7 million, and the ongoing RSF campaign since 2023, for which the US State Department issued a genocide determination on January 7, 2025, citing systematic mass killings and sexual violence against the Masalit and other non-Arab communities.
The 2003 genocide established the legal baseline. The ICC indicted Omar al-Bashir on July 12, 2010, on three counts of genocide, five counts of crimes against humanity, and two counts of war crimes. He remains in military detention in Sudan. In October 2025, the ICC convicted Ali Kushayb, a senior Janjaweed commander, on 27 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his conduct in Darfur during 2003 and 2004, sentencing him to 20 years’ imprisonment.
The RSF’s conduct in the current war mirrors the 2003 pattern in documented detail. In El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur State, a UN panel estimated that between 10,000 and 15,000 Masalit people were killed by RSF and allied Arab militias in 2023 alone. El Fasher, the last major Darfur city under SAF control, fell to the RSF in October 2025 after an 18-month siege. The UN Human Rights Council’s Independent Fact-Finding Mission reported in February 2026 that RSF actions at El Fasher showed “indicators of a genocidal path.”
The ICC’s genocide convention framework applied in Sudan’s Darfur is the same framework being examined in the Gaza-Israel conflict’s international criminal proceedings, where the International Court of Justice is separately reviewing alleged genocide convention violations.
The World’s Largest Displacement Crisis: Data, Scale, and Famine
The Sudan Civil War has displaced 14 million people as of April 2026, a quarter of Sudan’s total population, including 9 million internally displaced persons inside Sudan and 4.4 million refugees in Chad, South Sudan, Egypt, and Libya, a scale the UN High Commissioner for Refugees identifies as the world’s largest active displacement crisis.
Sudan surpassed Ukraine in total displacement numbers during mid-2024. Chad hosts over one million Sudanese refugees in addition to its own domestic displacement. South Sudan, which generates its own refugee population, is simultaneously receiving Sudanese refugees across its northern border.
UN OCHA estimates nearly 20 million people face acute food insecurity inside Sudan as of 2026. WFP reports that 4 million children under five are acutely malnourished, with 770,000 at imminent risk of death. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification confirmed famine at IPC Phase 5 in seven areas as of mid-2026, first established in displacement camps around El Fasher following the RSF’s October 2025 takeover of the city.
| Metric | Figure | Source | Date |
| Total displaced | 14 million (25% of population) | UNHCR | April 2026 |
| Internally displaced | 9 million | UNHCR | April 2026 |
| Cross-border refugees | 4.4 million | UNHCR | April 2026 |
| People requiring aid | 33.7 million | WHO | 2026 |
| Facing acute food insecurity | Nearly 20 million | UN OCHA | 2026 |
| Children acutely malnourished | 4 million under five | WFP | 2026 |
| IPC famine areas confirmed | 7 | IPC | Mid-2026 |
UAE Backs the RSF, Egypt Backs the SAF: Sudan’s Civil War as a Documented Regional Proxy Conflict
The Sudan Civil War has drawn external backing from at least eight countries, with the UAE identified in UN Panel of Experts reports and independent investigations as the RSF’s primary supporter through arms transfers routed via Chad, Libya, and Ethiopia, and through gold trade financial networks that generate RSF revenue outside any Sudanese banking system.
The UAE has repeatedly denied supplying weapons to the RSF. The UN Panel of Experts found these allegations credible. In October 2025, SAF forces recovered UAE-origin arms from previously RSF-held areas in southeast Sudan. Sudan filed a case at the International Court of Justice in March 2025 accusing the UAE of violating the Genocide Convention by arming the RSF. The ICJ dismissed it in May 2025 on jurisdictional grounds, not on the merits.
The Sudan Civil War’s proxy war structure, where third-party states arm one faction to pursue regional interests, mirrors the pattern documented in how the Russia-Ukraine war has been prolonged by external military backing from multiple state actors.
| Side | Primary Backers | Documented Support Type |
| RSF | UAE | Arms via Chad, Libya, Ethiopia; gold trade financing |
| RSF | Chad (transit) | Weapons routing corridor into Darfur |
| SAF | Egypt | Military training, arms, political alignment |
| SAF | Saudi Arabia | Diplomatic support, financial coordination |
| SAF | Eritrea | Military cooperation |
| SAF | Turkey | Drone technology (reported) |
| SAF | Iran | Arms deliveries (reported, 2024) |
Sudan Civil War in 2026: SAF Holds Khartoum, RSF Controls All Five Darfur Capitals, and El Obeid Faces Imminent Siege
The Sudan Civil War in 2026 is concentrated in three active theatres: the Kordofan region, where RSF forces have encircled El Obeid and threaten over 500,000 displaced civilians; Darfur, where the RSF controls all five state capitals after the fall of El Fasher in October 2025; and Blue Nile State, where fighting continues along tribal and territorial lines.
The SAF’s counteroffensive in late 2024 and early 2025 produced the most significant territorial recovery since April 2023. The SAF retook Khartoum’s presidential palace on March 21, 2025, and General al-Burhan declared the capital liberated on March 26. Sudan’s transitional government returned to Khartoum on January 11, 2026, after operating from Port Sudan for nearly three years.
As of July 2026, RSF forces have encircled El Obeid in North Kordofan, where over 500,000 displaced civilians are sheltering. The UN Human Rights Council convened an urgent debate on the city on July 3, 2026. UN High Commissioner Volker Türk confirmed that drone strikes killed over 1,000 Sudanese civilians in the first five months of 2026, reflecting a 600% increase from 2024 to 2025 figures.
Universalnest covers the Sudan Civil War within its Current Affairs reporting on global politics, war, economy, climate, and the events shaping 2026.
From the 2023 Jeddah Declaration to the 2025 Quad Roadmap: Why Four Peace Processes Have Produced Zero Binding Ceasefires
Four years of international diplomacy on the Sudan Civil War, including the May 2023 Jeddah Declaration, African Union mediation rounds, a British-led London conference in April 2025, and a September 2025 Quad roadmap backed by the US, UK, Saudi Arabia, and UAE, have produced no binding ceasefire, no enforced humanitarian access agreement, and no political transition structure.
The Jeddah Declaration of May 2023, brokered by Saudi Arabia and the United States, produced a signed ceasefire that both sides violated within days. It carried no monitoring mechanism and no penalty for violation. African Union mediation attempts through 2024 failed because the SAF refused any process including the UAE, citing its documented arms deliveries to the RSF.
The September 2025 Quad roadmap proposed a three-month humanitarian truce followed by a nine-month civilian-led political transition. The RSF accepted the truce portion. The SAF rejected the full process. As of July 2026, no ceasefire has materialised.
The ICC’s October 2025 conviction of Ali Kushayb on 27 counts remains the only concluded international criminal action on the Sudan Civil War. Sudan’s military court sentenced RSF leader Hemedti and 15 RSF officers to death in absentia on July 12, 2026, in the first domestic prosecution of RSF leadership since the war began.
For current displacement and territorial control data, the CFR Global Conflict Tracker for Sudan and UNHCR’s Sudan situation page provide the most current institutional figures.
Frequently Asked Questions
What role does gold play in funding the Sudan Civil War?
The RSF controls Sudan’s primary artisanal gold mining areas in Darfur and Kordofan. Gold is routed through UAE-connected financial networks, generating revenue that funds RSF operations independently of any Sudanese banking system. CSIS and UN investigators identified the gold trade as the RSF’s primary independent income source since 2013.
Who is General Hemedti and how did he rise to power?
General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, rose from a Janjaweed-linked trader to RSF commander after al-Bashir selected him in 2013 to lead the newly formalised paramilitary. RSF deployments to Yemen and Libya built him foreign alliances and personal wealth that eventually rivalled al-Burhan’s political and military standing inside Sudan.
What happened at El Geneina in 2023 and why does it matter?
A UN panel estimated that between 10,000 and 15,000 Masalit people were killed by RSF and allied Arab militias in El Geneina and West Darfur State in 2023 alone. This became the war’s first confirmed mass atrocity and formed a primary basis for the US State Department’s genocide determination issued on January 7, 2025.
Has famine been officially declared in Sudan and where?
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification confirmed famine at IPC Phase 5 in seven areas of Sudan as of mid-2026. Famine was first confirmed in displacement camps around El Fasher following the RSF’s October 2025 takeover and the blocking of humanitarian aid corridors into North Darfur.
What was the Jeddah Declaration and why did it fail?
The Jeddah Declaration of May 2023, brokered by Saudi Arabia and the United States, produced a signed ceasefire that both sides violated within days. It had no monitoring body, no enforcement mechanism, and no penalty clause. Humanitarian access commitments made in the text had no operational implementation structure behind them.
Which communities have been most targeted by RSF violence in Darfur?
The Masalit, Fur, and Zaghawa communities, all predominantly non-Arab farming peoples, have been the primary targets of RSF attacks in Darfur. The US State Department’s January 2025 genocide determination cited systematic killings and sexual violence against Masalit communities in West Darfur as meeting the Genocide Convention’s legal threshold.
What is El Obeid and why is it critical in 2026?
El Obeid is the capital of North Kordofan State and a key road and rail hub linking Sudan’s western and southern regions to Khartoum. As of July 2026, RSF forces have encircled it, trapping over 500,000 displaced civilians inside. The UN Human Rights Council held an urgent debate on the city on July 3, 2026.
