Thousands missing, new horrors emerge after RSF’s takeover of El Fasher in Sudan | Sudan War News

Hungry and battered civilians have told harrowing stories after fleeing the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in Darfur, western Sudan, while thousands more remain missing.

The capital of North Darfur state was the Sudanese army’s last stronghold in the vast region before falling to the RSF after an 18-month siege on Sunday.

Since then, the United Nations and international aid agencies have raised the alarm about the fate of civilians as accounts of mass killings, rape and other abuses continue to emerge.

Alkheir Ismail, a young Sudanese man who fled to the town of Tawila, about 50 kilometers (31 miles) away, said he was among a group of 300 people who were detained by RSF fighters as they tried to escape El Fasher on Sunday. The combatants only forgave him because one of the captors recognized him from their school days, he added.

“There was a young man I studied with, at the university in Khartoum, and he told them: ‘Don’t kill him’. After that, they killed the rest of the people, the young people who were with me and my friends.”

Other Sudanese in Tawila also described the fear they felt after being detained by the fighters.

“Suddenly they appeared, I don’t know where. Three young men of different ages arrived. They shot in the air and said: ‘Stop, stop’. They were wearing RSF clothing,” said Tahani Hassan. “They beat us hard. They threw our clothes on the ground. Even me, as a woman, was searched. The attacker could be younger than my daughter.”

Fatima Abdulrahim, who fled with her grandchildren, said she walked for five days in brutal conditions to reach Tawila.

“They beat the boys and took everything we had, they left us with nothing. When we got here, we learned that the girls in the group that came after us had been raped, but our girls escaped,” he said.

Rawaa Abdalla, a young woman who fled the city, said her father is missing.

“We don’t know if he is alive or dead, if he is with the people who left or if he is injured,” he said.

In a speech Wednesday night, RSF chief Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo called on his fighters to protect civilians and said violations will be prosecuted.

On Thursday, the paramilitary group, which has been fighting the Sudanese army since April 2023, claimed to have detained several fighters accused of abuses, but UN Humanitarian Affairs chief Tom Fletcher questioned RSF’s commitment to investigating the violations.

A senior RSF commander called the accounts “media exaggeration” by the army and its allied fighters “to cover up their defeat and loss” of el-Fasher, according to the Reuters news agency.

Both the RSF and the military have faced accusations of war crimes over the course of the conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people, forced some 14 million from their homes and created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, according to the UN. Famine is widespread and outbreaks of cholera and other deadly diseases are on the rise.

‘Killed, blocked, persecuted’

More than 62,000 people fled El Fasher between Sunday and Wednesday, according to the UN. At the end of August, El Fasher was still home to 260,000 people.

In a statement on Friday, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said that agencies operating on the ground estimate that just over 5,000 people managed to reach Tawila in the last five days.

“Based on what patients tell us, the most likely answer, although terrifying, is that they are being killed, blocked and chased when they try to flee,” said MSF emergencies chief Michel Olivier Lacharite, calling on mediators from the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt to intervene.

MSF said that all of the 70 children under five years old newly arrived in Tawila on October 27 were suffering from acute malnutrition and that 57 percent of them were suffering from severe acute malnutrition.

Survivors told the aid agency that RSF fighters separated people by gender, age or perceived ethnic identity, and that many were held for ransom, with sums ranging from 5 million to 30 million Sudanese pounds (more than $8,000 to almost $50,000).

Another survivor reported gruesome scenes in which RSF fighters crushed several prisoners with their vehicles, he said.

We denounce the horrendous atrocities and mass killings, both indiscriminate and against ethnic groups, that have culminated this week in and around El Fasher, Sudan.https://t.co/YGo84UxEn5

— MSF International (@MSF) October 31, 2025

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the organization’s sexual and reproductive health agency, which provides humanitarian assistance in Tawila, spoke to more survivors while protecting their identities.

A 24-year-old man said that out of a group of 200 men, women and children, only four people who could pay a ransom ended up surviving four different encounters with RSF soldiers at checkpoints on the way to Tawila.

“The rest were killed. They killed children, the elderly and women. I can’t describe the scene, it was unbearable to see people die in front of you, each one with a single bullet,” he said.

A 26-year-old woman said her husband could only pay the ransom for her and her children and was murdered in front of them. A 19-year-old girl said she was raped by soldiers after they asked her if she was a virgin.

UNFPA has also confirmed that at least 460 people were killed by RSF fighters at the El-Fasher maternity hospital on 29 October.

The actual death toll may have been much higher, with patients, visitors, displaced people and health workers among the dead, he said.

More killings in Kordofan

In nearby North Kordofan state, the UN estimates that more than 36,000 people have fled the town of Bara, which was captured by RSF last week.

The UN says North Kordofan will likely be the next battleground between the RSF and the Sudanese army, as the state capital, El-Obeid, remains under army control.

“Reports of serious violations are also emerging in the context of the RSF’s capture of the city of Barra, including the alleged summary execution of five Red Crescent volunteers. Our human rights colleagues have also received alarming reports of sexual violence,” Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, told reporters on Friday.

Mohammed Elsheikh, spokesperson for the Sudan Doctors Network, told Al Jazeera from Manchester, United Kingdom, that the people fleeing Barça are in very poor health.

“It is a long walk between Bara and the city of El-Obeid, through very unsafe roads and in very difficult environmental conditions. We are talking about a desert, really high temperatures during the day and extremely cold weather at night,” he said.

Bara has been the scene of intense fighting between the army and the RSF, and the paramilitary group has also advanced into nearby areas.

In July, RSF fighters invaded villages in North Kordofan and burned them in an attack that killed nearly 300 people, including children and pregnant women.