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The volunteer nurse Nawal Khalil had been working as a healthcare worker for three years at El Fasher South hospital when the city was taken over on Sunday by the RSF fighters. She was busy treating patients, including an elderly woman who needed a blood transfusion, when the attack began.

“They murdered six wounded military personnel and civilians in their beds – some of them women,” she recounts. “The outcome remains unknown to my other patients. I was forced to flee after they raided the medical facility.”

The 27-year-old Khalil, was hit by a bullet in her right foot and upper leg as RSF fighters took control of the nearby military headquarters. She escaped from the city and journeyed by foot for 24 hours, wounded and without nourishment, to arrive at Garney town. “On the way, they seized my mobile and currency,” she explains. “I was left with nothing.”

Over a thousand individuals – featuring females and minors – journeyed by walking for 48 hours to arrive at Tawila town in North Darfur after fleeing El Fasher, which was seized following an 18-month blockade.

This settlement, approximately 34 miles westward of El Fasher, remains under the authority by the SLA faction commanded by Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur.

On Tuesday, the collaborative Joint Forces – that cooperate with the Sudanese army – accused the RSF for slaughtering in excess of 2,000 non-combatants following the urban center's takeover. The UN said that visual evidence showed depicting dozens of weaponless men who were shot or found dead, surrounded by RSF fighters.”

Historical Background

Fighting broke out in Khartoum on 15 April 2023 as an escalating power struggle between the two main factions of the armed forces leadership eventually resulted in fatalities.

Among the combatants stand the Sudanese military forces, who remain broadly loyal to Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the nation's actual leader. Challenging him stand the paramilitary forces belonging to the RSF, a collection of militias that obey the former warlord Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, called Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the previous authoritarian leader Omar al-Bashir himself as a pro-Arab counterinsurgency force called the Janjaweed, which soon became linked with widespread atrocities. Back in 2013, Bashir reformed the faction into the RSF, sending them to suppress a recent insurrection within South Darfur.

The war has pushed Sudan into among the most severe humanitarian crises in recent history”, according to UN officials. It has generated the world’s worst displacement crisis, forcing more than 10 million persons internally plus 4 million who escaped to bordering states, generating growing stress on both Chad and South Sudan.

Present Circumstances

According to witnesses, many additional civilians stay confined by RSF forces and partner militias in Garney, in the southwestern direction from El Fasher. Numerous are ex-military personnel 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 requests ranging from 5 to 10 million Sudanese pounds (£6,000 to £12,000), per those who escaped who reached Tawila. Those unable to pay remain imprisoned for several days, and occasionally freed only when developing critical health conditions.

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

The individual Adam Yagoub, 28, a chauffeur from Sennar within central Sudan, closely avoided death following his capture by three camel-riding militiamen close to Garney.

“They planned to decapitate me with a blade,” he recounts, exhibiting his limb, that one combatant struck with the butt of an AK-47 rifle. “Afterward one remembered me – his brother was my colleague – and pleaded with them to spare me. There were 18 of us who exited El Fasher as a group, but only eight made it to Tawila. I think the others are dead.”

Yagoub says he observed 22 corpses near what he called a “fake well” employed by the RSF and partner armed groups along the Garney-Tawila route. “This is an ambush,” he comments. “Individuals travel all day lacking water, and when they reach it, the militiamen await. They murdered 22 males at that location and took the bodies away to obscure them.”

An additional nurse who fled the El Fasher South medical facility after the attack on Sunday reported RSF militiamen penetrated via one entrance and opened fire on patients in the ER section, killing at least eight. “We ran out via another entrance, yet they assaulted my head with a firearm,” he recounts.

Via a recorded message on Wednesday, the RSF commander, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, called Hemedti, stated that any military personnel or officer who had “violated the right of any individual would face consequences.

Numerous individuals who fled from El Fasher passed hours concealing themselves near military artillery prior to escaping westward under cover of darkness. Already displaced families from Abu Shouk camp in the city were forced to move again, finding shelter in Daraja Oula area before eventually heading for Tawila.

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