Khartoum: A paramilitary drone attack on the southern Sudan city of Kadugli killed eight civilians including three children on Tuesday, hours after the army broke a punishing siege on the city.
The South Kordofan state capital Kadugli, where the United Nations confirmed a famine last year, had been under siege for much of Sudan's nearly three-year war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. Army chief Abdel Fattah al Burhan on Tuesday congratulated the people of Kadugli on the army's advance, the latest reversal of a paramilitary offensive through the crucial Kordofan region.
Hours later, an RSF drone attack rocked the city, where civilians who had endured months of famine had begun to celebrate, a military source said.
All but one were shot down by army defences, with a single drone striking a health centre and killing eight civilians, a medical source in the city said.
Asked to confirm the army victory, an RSF source said the paramilitary "remained nearby and will continue to besiege" both Kadugli and Dilling, where the army broke a similar siege late last month.
State broadcaster Sudan TV aired footage of people in Kadugli celebrating and flashing victory signs as military personnel passed by atop army vehicles.
"This is a great day, people welcomed the army, women ululated, even the children celebrated," Issa Tih, a resident of Kadugli, said.
"We lived through incredibly hard times." he added.
The blockade was enforced by RSF fighters and their allies, a faction of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North led by Abdelaziz al Hilu.
As famine closed in, around 80 per cent of Kadugli's population, about 147,000 people, were forced to flee the city, the UN said last week.
The wider Kordofan region is currently the war's fiercest battleground, where hundreds of thousands face starvation.
After seizing the army's last Darfur foothold of El Fasher in October, the RSF pushed deeper into Kordofan in an attempt to retake Sudan's central corridor.
They had intensified their siege on Kadugli and the nearby town of Dilling, where the army recently pushed through paramilitary lines.
According to an army source, troops advancing from Dilling along the volatile 100-kilometre corridor defeated RSF and SPLM-N units following "fierce battles".
An RSF source said that army forces "infiltrated Dilling and Kadugli through rugged areas where forces were not present".
Since the conflict erupted in April 2023, it has killed tens of thousands, displaced 11 million people and driven multiple regions into hunger and famine.
It has also split the country in two, with the army holding Sudan's north and east while the RSF and its allies dominate the west and parts of the south.
Mohammed Jumaa, another resident of Kadugli who stayed in the city throughout the siege, said he felt "indescribable joy" at the army's arrival on Tuesday.
"These last few months we have been terrified that the RSF would enter Kadugli and do what it did in El Fasher," he said.
The UN has repeatedly warned of atrocities unfolding in Kordofan, echoing the summary killings and abductions reported during the RSF's takeover of North Darfur state capital El Fasher last year.
To escape Kadugli, some families have been forced to trek through the rocky spine of the Nuba Mountains, on long and perilous journeys.
Those that stayed, like Jumaa, "were so hungry we ate leaves" to survive.
For months, starving residents were trapped under artillery and drone strikes, with some telling AFP they had eaten "whatever they can find in the forest", at times leading to poisoning deaths.
In recent months, the violence across Kordofan has included drone strikes killing dozens at a time, and forced at least 88,000 people to flee between October and January, according to UN data.
Speaking to reporters, Burhan on Tuesday said there would be "no truce, no ceasefire so long as the RSF occupies cities".
"We respond to all calls for peace, but we will not sell out the blood of the Sudanese people," he added.
"There cannot be a truce that strengthens the enemy, there cannot be a ceasefire that allows this militia to get back up again."
Sudan's army last month received the latest truce proposal, presented by the United States and Saudi Arabia, but has not yet accepted it. — AFP
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