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A nurse named Nawal Khalil had been volunteering as a medical volunteer for three years at El Fasher South hospital after the city fell captured on Sunday by the RSF fighters. She was busy treating patients, including an elderly woman who needed a blood transfusion, as the assault commenced.

“They killed six wounded soldiers plus civilian patients in their beds – among them female victims,” she recounts. “The outcome remains unknown to my other patients. I was forced to flee as they invaded the hospital.”

The 27-year-old Khalil, was hit by a bullet in her right foot and upper leg while RSF combatants gained control of the nearby military headquarters. She escaped from the city and walked for a day, wounded and without nourishment, to get to the settlement of Garney. “Along the route, they took my phone and currency,” she explains. “I possessed nothing remaining.”

More than 1,000 people – including women and children – walked for two days to arrive at Tawila town within North Darfur after running from El Fasher, which fell under control following an 18-month blockade.

This settlement, about 34 miles (55km) west of El Fasher, is governed by by the SLA faction led by Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur (SLA-AW).

On Tuesday, the collaborative Joint Forces – that cooperate with the Sudanese army – charged the RSF with murdering over 2,000 civilians since the fall of the city. The UN reported that footage existed showing “dozens of unarmed men who were shot or found dead, with RSF militiamen around them.”

Background Context

Fighting broke out within Khartoum on 15 April 2023 as an escalating power struggle among the two primary factions of the armed forces leadership ultimately became violent.

From one perspective stand the Sudanese military forces, which maintain general loyalty towards General al-Burhan, the de facto head of state. Against him exist the irregular troops of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a gathering of armed factions that obey the former warlord General Dagalo, known as Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the previous authoritarian leader Omar al-Bashir himself as an Arab counterinsurgency militia named the Janjaweed, which quickly became synonymous with massive human rights violations. During 2013, Bashir transformed the group to become the RSF, using them to quell a recent insurrection in southern Darfur.

The fighting has thrown Sudan into “one of the worst humanitarian nightmares in modern times, as per UN representatives. It has produced the globe's most severe displacement emergency, forcing more than 10 million persons within the country and 4 million who have fled to adjacent nations, putting mounting pressure on Chad and South Sudan.

Ongoing Developments

According to witnesses, many additional civilians continue to be held by the RSF and partner militias within Garney, southwest from El Fasher. Numerous are ex-military personnel from the Sudanese army, the collaborative forces and other armed groups which had been combatting together with the army. They are apparently detained since they cannot pay ransom requests ranging from 5 to 10 million Sudanese pounds (around six to twelve thousand pounds), according to survivors who arrived in Tawila. Individuals incapable of paying remain imprisoned for several days, and sometimes let go solely after developing critical health conditions.

Reports suggest the SLA-AW has authorized military personnel escaping El Fasher to come into Tawila if they relinquish their arms.

Adam Yagoub, 28, a driver from Sennar within central Sudan, narrowly escaped being killed subsequent to his seizure by three camel-riding militiamen in the Garney vicinity.

“They intended to behead me with a knife,” he informs, showing his arm, that one combatant struck using an AK-47 rifle butt. “Then one of them recognised me – his brother was my colleague – and begged them not to kill me. We were 18 people who exited El Fasher as a group, but only eight made it to Tawila. I think the others are dead.”

Yagoub reports he saw 22 bodies near what he called a “fake well” utilized by RSF forces and partner armed groups between Garney and Tawila. “It’s a trap,” he comments. “People walk all day without water, and when they get to it, the militias are waiting. They slaughtered 22 men on that spot and removed the corpses to conceal them.”

Another nurse who ran from South El Fasher hospital after the attack on Sunday said RSF fighters entered through one gate and commenced firing upon patients in the emergency ward, murdering no less than eight. “We escaped through a different gate, however they struck my head using a rifle,” he states.

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

Numerous individuals who fled El Fasher utilized hours taking cover close to army artillery positions before running west under cover of darkness. Families already uprooted from the city’s Abu Shouk camp had to displace once more, taking asylum in the Daraja Oula district before finally moving toward Tawila.

People apprehended by RSF forces in Garney were reportedly given {water mixed with flour|flour