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Nawal Khalil had been serving as a nurse over a three-year period within the South El Fasher hospital when the city was captured on Sunday by RSF paramilitaries. She was occupied with patient care, among them an older female patient who needed a blood transfusion, as the assault commenced.

“They murdered six wounded military personnel plus civilian patients in their beds – including some women,” she states. “The outcome remains unknown regarding my other patients. I was forced to flee when they stormed the hospital.”

The 27-year-old Khalil, was shot in the right foot and upper leg as RSF fighters took control of the closeby army headquarters. She escaped from the city and journeyed by foot for 24 hours, wounded and without nourishment, to get to the settlement of Garney. “During the journey, they confiscated my phone and money,” she describes. “I possessed nothing remaining.”

Over a thousand individuals – comprising women and children – walked for two days to arrive at Tawila town in North Darfur following their escape from El Fasher, which fell under control after an 18-month siege.

Tawila, around 55 kilometers to the west from El Fasher, remains under the authority by the SLA faction led by Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur (SLA-AW).

On Tuesday, the collaborative Joint Forces – which partner with Sudan's military – charged the RSF with murdering over 2,000 civilians since the fall of the city. United Nations officials stated there were videos depicting dozens of weaponless men who were shot or found dead, surrounded by RSF fighters.”

Contextual Information

Fighting broke out within Khartoum on 15 April 2023 when an intensifying power struggle between the two main factions within the military government ultimately became violent.

On one side exist the official Sudanese army, which maintain general loyalty to General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the country’s de facto ruler. Opposing him stand the paramilitary forces belonging to the RSF, a gathering of armed factions which support the ex-warlord General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, called Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the previous authoritarian leader Bashir's regime as a pro-Arab counterinsurgency force known as the Janjaweed, which quickly became synonymous with widespread atrocities. During 2013, Bashir transformed the group into the RSF, deploying them to crush a new uprising in South Darfur.

The fighting has thrown Sudan into among the most severe humanitarian crises in recent history”, based on UN statements. It has produced the globe's most severe displacement emergency, scattering more than 10 million people inside the nation along with 4 million refugees into neighbouring countries, generating growing stress on Chad and South Sudan.

Current Situation Updates

Per observer reports, thousands more civilians stay confined by RSF forces and allied militias in Garney, in the southwestern direction from El Fasher. Several are previous army members from Sudan's armed forces, the collaborative forces and other militant organizations that had been fighting alongside the army. They are reportedly being held because they cannot afford ransom demands between five and ten million Sudanese pounds (around six to twelve thousand pounds), based on survivor accounts who made it to Tawila. Individuals incapable of paying have been held for multiple days, and sometimes released only after falling seriously ill.

The SLA-AW has reportedly allowed military personnel escaping El Fasher to come into Tawila on condition they surrender their weapons.

Adam Yagoub, 28, a driver from Sennar in central Sudan, narrowly escaped being killed subsequent to his seizure by three armed men mounted on camels close to Garney.

“They wanted to cut my head off with a knife,” he recounts, displaying his arm, which one militant assaulted using an AK-47 rifle butt. “Afterward one remembered me – his brother had worked with me – and pleaded with them to spare me. There were 18 of us who departed El Fasher collectively, however just eight arrived in Tawila. I think the others are dead.”

Yagoub states he observed 22 corpses near what he called a “fake well” utilized by RSF forces and associated militias in the area connecting Garney and Tawila. “This is an ambush,” he says. “Individuals travel all day lacking water, and when they get to it, the militias are waiting. They killed 22 men there and took the bodies away to conceal them.”

An additional nurse who fled the El Fasher South medical facility subsequent to Sunday's offensive reported RSF militiamen penetrated using one doorway and began shooting at patients in the emergency ward, causing at least eight fatalities. “We ran out via another entrance, but they hit me on the head with a firearm,” he recounts.

Through a video declaration on Wednesday, the leader of the RSF, Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, said that any soldier or commander who infringed upon the rights of any person” would be held accountable.

Many of those who escaped El Fasher spent hours hiding near the army’s artillery unit prior to escaping westward under cover of darkness. Already displaced families from Abu Shouk camp in the city had to displace once more, seeking refuge in the Daraja Oula neighbourhood prior to ultimately traveling to Tawila.

People apprehended by RSF forces within Garney reportedly received {water mixed with flour|flour