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Nawal Khalil had been serving as a healthcare worker for the past three years in the El Fasher South medical facility when the city was captured on Sunday by the RSF fighters. She was occupied with patient care, among them an older female patient who needed a blood transfusion, as the assault commenced.

“They killed six wounded soldiers and civilians in their beds – including some women,” she recounts. “I don’t know what happened regarding my other patients. I was forced to flee as they invaded the hospital.”

Khalil, aged 27, was shot in the right foot and upper leg as RSF fighters took control of the nearby military headquarters. She ran from the urban area and traveled on foot for one day, wounded and without nourishment, to arrive at Garney town. “During the journey, they seized my mobile and currency,” she says. “I was left with nothing.”

In excess of 1,000 persons – comprising women and children – walked for two days to reach the town of Tawila within North Darfur after running from El Fasher, which fell under control after an 18-month siege.

This settlement, approximately 34 miles westward from El Fasher, is governed by of the Sudan Liberation Army faction led by Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur (SLA-AW).

This past Tuesday, the allied Joint Forces – who are allied with Sudan’s army – blamed the RSF with murdering over 2,000 civilians following the urban center's takeover. United Nations officials stated that visual evidence showed featuring numerous unarmed males either being shot or deceased, encircled by RSF combatants.”

Historical Background

Fighting broke out in Sudan's capital on 15 April 2023 as an escalating power struggle between the two main factions within the military government finally turned deadly.

On one side stand the Sudanese military forces, which maintain general loyalty towards General al-Burhan, the de facto head of state. Against him stand the paramilitary forces of the RSF paramilitary group, a collection of militias who follow the former warlord General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the ex-dictator Omar al-Bashir himself as a pro-Arab counterinsurgency force known as the Janjaweed, which soon became linked with widespread atrocities. In 2013, Bashir transformed the group into the Rapid Support Forces, deploying them to crush a recent insurrection in South Darfur.

The conflict has plunged Sudan into “one of the worst humanitarian nightmares in recent history”, as per UN representatives. It has created the planet's biggest displacement catastrophe, scattering more than 10 million people inside the nation and 4 million who have fled to adjacent nations, putting mounting pressure upon Chad and South Sudan.

Present Circumstances

Based on eyewitness accounts, thousands more civilians stay confined by RSF forces and associated armed groups in Garney, in the southwestern direction from El Fasher. Many are former soldiers belonging to the Sudanese military, the allied Joint Forces plus additional armed factions which had been combatting together with the army. They are apparently detained since they cannot pay ransom demands ranging from 5 to 10 million Sudanese pounds (£6,000 to £12,000), per those who escaped who arrived in Tawila. People who cannot afford payment remain imprisoned for several days, and sometimes let go solely after falling seriously ill.

The SLA-AW has apparently permitted military personnel escaping El Fasher to enter Tawila on condition they surrender their weapons.

The individual Adam Yagoub, 28, a motorist originating from Sennar in central Sudan, barely avoided execution subsequent to his seizure by three militiamen on camels in the Garney vicinity.

“They wanted to cut my head off using a knife,” he tells, exhibiting his limb, that one combatant struck using an AK-47 rifle butt. “Afterward one remembered me – his brother was my colleague – and pleaded with them to spare me. We were 18 people who exited El Fasher as a group, but only eight made it to Tawila. I believe the remainder perished.”

Yagoub reports he saw 22 bodies close to what he described as a fraudulent water source employed by the RSF and associated militias between Garney and Tawila. “This is an ambush,” he says. “Persons journey daily without hydration, and when they get to it, the militiamen await. They murdered 22 males at that location and carried the bodies off to obscure them.”

An additional nurse who ran from South El Fasher hospital subsequent to Sunday's offensive reported RSF militiamen penetrated via one entrance and commenced firing upon patients within the emergency department, murdering no less than eight. “We escaped through a different gate, however they struck my head with a firearm,” he says.

In a video statement on Wednesday, the head of the RSF, General Dagalo, known as Hemedti, stated that any military personnel or official who breached the rights of any person” would be held accountable.

Many of those who escaped El Fasher utilized hours concealing themselves near military artillery before running west under cover of darkness. Previously displaced households from the city’s Abu Shouk camp were compelled to relocate again, seeking refuge in the Daraja Oula neighbourhood before finally moving toward Tawila.

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