Sudanese Civil War
Fighting broke out in Khartoum on 15 April 2023 between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces, two branches of the same government. Both had taken power together. General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo — known as Hemedti — had removed Omar al-Bashir in 2019 after months of protest, agreed a transition with the civilian movement, and then jointly overthrew the civilian prime minister in October 2021. The war began over the terms on which the RSF would be integrated into the army, which is to say over which of them would end up in charge. The RSF is the successor of the Janjaweed, the militias armed by Bashir to fight the Darfur insurgency from 2003, and Hemedti had built it into a force with its own gold mines, foreign contracts and mercenary deployments in Yemen and Libya. Khartoum became a battlefield within hours — a capital of six million with the fighting in residential streets, the airport destroyed, hospitals shelled and the national museum looted. The RSF then took most of Darfur and conducted killings in West Darfur that the United States and others have designated genocide against the Masalit. The army recovered Khartoum in 2025. Around 150,000 people are estimated to have died, and some twelve million have been displaced — the largest displacement crisis in the world, with famine confirmed in several areas. The United Arab Emirates has been widely reported as supplying the RSF, and Egypt and others the army. No settlement has been reached. The country that split in two in 2011 is now splitting again, along a line neither side calls a border.
- Year: 2023 CE
- Category: Military
