New report exposes horrific impacts of war in Sudan

Tens of thousands of people have been killed, many more injured and millions displaced since a conflict erupted in Sudan in April, 2023, a new report has revealed. 

The Amnesty International survey released yesterday says the war has triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

While Amnesty did not provide an overall verified death toll, it documented about 19,000 fatalities recorded by medical facilities in El Fasher alone between April, 2023 and May, 2025.

The agency said it collected 19 videos documenting one “large massacre” near the berm, about 12 kilometres north-west of El Fasher. 

The study conducted between March and May last year collected and verified 89 video evidence and interviewed 275 victims. 

The organisation said women and children have borne a disproportionate brunt of the war, with nearly one in five people injured by explosive weapons being children, while about 3,00 people in the area reportedly died after succumbing to injuries sustained during attacks.

In a December, 2024 assault on the Abu Zerega area, Amnesty documented a list of 122 deaths shared by residents, including seven children. 

Of the statistics, the organisation independently verified 13 of the deaths and received the names of an additional 15 victims.

Within the same period, Amnesty noted that it also collected the names of 21 people killed in another attack, including three teenage boys.

“Children were not collateral damage of this violence-often, they were deliberately targeted and have suffered immensely. They have been killed, injured, raped, abducted and forcibly recruited on massive scale,” said Secretary General Agnes Callamard. 

She said the human toll of the conflict is wiping out a generation in what Callamard described as “the largest humanitarian crisis in the world.” 

According to the report titled “City Under Siege, Children Under Fire”, more than 10.5 million people have been internally displaced, while about four million others have fled to neighbouring countries, including Kenya, Egypt, Chad, Uganda and South Sudan.

Children account for the majority of those displaced, with 55 per cent of internally displaced people being children while about 17 million of them are out of school as a result of the conflict.

Women interviewed described giving birth in extremely harsh conditions, including inside sweltering underground bomb shelters and hospitals that had come under shelling.

The organisation also interviewed 26 survivors of sexual violence, including 20 female survivors of rape, among them teenage girls.

Amnesty further accused the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of abducting civilians and holding many of them in inhumane conditions. 

Of the 45 hostage cases documented by the organisation, 36 involved people held for ransom, including five children. The report also documented the recruitment and use of children by armed groups.

The agency blamed support the RSF group receives from United Arab Emirates and Egypt even as they singled out RSF Commander Gedo Hamdan Ahmed and Colonel Abbas Khater Bakhit. 

The Kenyan government has also been accused of providing a route for transporting weapons to the war-torn country as well as hosting senior members of RSF.  Callamard called for immediate ceasefire, urging the international community to “move beyond statements of concerns and take concrete steps.” 

“Kenya must leverage its power and influence in the region to ensure RSF and other parties to the conflict stop the violations and a ceasefire is agreed,” said Japheth Biegon, Amnesty’s East and Southern Africa deputy director.