The army in Sudan says it has captured a key city in the country’s east, one of its biggest gains yet in an almost two-year-long war against rebel forces.
Footage on social media showed people celebrating in the streets as army soldiers entered the city of Wad Madani.
The leader of paramilitary group the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, acknowledged the loss in an audio message.
His admission was angry and rambling, attributing the defeat to the army’s air superiority and use of Iranian-made drones.
But he vowed to continue fighting until victory, even if it took another 20 years.
Wad Madani is the capital of the state of Al Jazira, and is 87 miles (140km) south of the country’s capital, Khartoum.
Violence broke out between the army and RSF in April 2023 following days of tension as members of the RSF were redeployed around the country in a move that the army saw as a threat.
The war has claimed tens of thousands of lives. And in what the United Nations has called one of the world’s “largest displacement crises”, about nine million people have been forced to flee their homes.
The country is also slipping into a famine, with 24.6 million people – about half the population – in urgent need of food aid, experts said.
Earlier this month, the US sanctioned the RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo after it accused the group of committing genocide.
Officials said he was being punished for his role in “systematic” atrocities against the Sudanese people during the 20-month conflict.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday said Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, was being punished for his role in “systematic” atrocities against the Sudanese people during the 20-month conflict.
He said the RSF and allied militias were responsible for the murder of “men and boys – even infants”, as well as brutal sexual violence against women on ethnic grounds.
The militias have also targeted fleeing civilians and murdered innocent people escaping the conflict, Blinken said.
In response, the RSF accused the US of double standards and failing to effectively address the ongoing crisis.
“The decision… expresses the failure of the [US President Joe] Biden administration to deal with the Sudanese crisis and the double standards it followed [with regards to the crisis],” Hemedti’s adviser, El-Basha Tbaeq, said in a post on his X account.
He added that this may complicate the Sudanese crisis and hinder negotiations to address the root causes of the conflict.
The RSF has been fighting the Sudanese military since April 2023, and there has been a growing outcry about its conduct during the war.
The US had previously determined that the RSF and other militias had engaged in war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing in the western Darfur region, where the group has been accused of targeting and killing non-Arabs.
Both sides have been accused of atrocities, with the conflict leading to one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
In May, US special envoy for Sudan Tom Perriello said that some estimates suggested up to 150,000 people had been killed in the conflict.
Famine has been declared in several parts of the country, with 24.6 million people – about half the population – in urgent need of food aid, according to experts.
Blinken said neither the RSF nor Sudan’s military were fit to govern Sudan.
“Both belligerents bear responsibility for the violence and suffering in Sudan and lack the legitimacy to govern a future peaceful Sudan,” he said.
The sanctions bar Hemedti and his immediate family members from visiting the US, and any personal assets there are blocked.
Seven RSF-owned companies based in the United Arab Emirates and one other individual are also being sanctioned for helping the paramilitary group procure weapons. The UAE has denied numerous accusations that it is funding and arming the RSF.
In a statement, the UAE also said it took “its role in protecting the integrity of the international financial system extremely seriously. We remain committed to combating financial crime globally.”
Almost all the sanctioned companies are connected to the gold trade. One of them, AZ Gold, imports gold from Sudan and then sells it.
The US Treasury said in a statement that one of Hemedti’s brothers, Algoney, maintained access to AZ Gold’s bank account in the UAE, which held millions of dollars.
Hemedti and the RSF have controlled some of the country’s most lucrative gold mines, in Jebel Amer in North Darfur, and is now said to control others in Songo near the border with Central African Republic, as well as more over the border.
The sanctioning of Hemedti, means all three Dagalo brothers, including his deputy Abdel Rahim and his younger brother and procurement chief Algoney, are now under US sanctions.
By Agencies
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