General al-Burhan’s forces (SAF) rained unguided bombs on densely populated districts of Nyala, South Darfur, in a three-day span in early February, killing at least several dozen civilians and wounding scores more in strikes that Human Rights Watch says constitute war crimes.
A 38-page report released Tuesday by the New York-based watchdog documents five airstrikes on Feb. 3 alone — part of what residents described as near-daily bombardment since the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seized Nyala in October 2023.
The city, Darfur’s largest and once home to more than 800,000 people, has become a flashpoint in Sudan’s two-year civil war.
“The Sudanese military repeatedly hit busy residential and commercial areas with weapons that cannot be aimed precisely,” said Jean-Baptiste Gallopin, senior crisis researcher at Human Rights Watch. “These attacks wiped out families, terrorized communities and forced thousands to flee.”
‘People were cut to pieces’
Witnesses interviewed by the group recalled a white, cargo-style aircraft circling above Nyala on Feb. 3. Within 40 minutes, bombs detonated on Congo Road, outside Mecca Eye Hospital, near the Cinema traffic circle and inside the Al-Jumhuriya neighborhood.
- At the Mecca Eye Hospital, a blast destroyed a grocery kiosk, shredded a passing Toyota Land Cruiser and spattered shrapnel across storefronts. A health worker said 13 bodies — among them market vendors and an elderly woman — were recovered within minutes. Three uniformed RSF fighters who had been sipping tea on the curb were also killed, he said.
- A second bomb on nearby Congo Road killed a 40-year-old woman and her nephew as they ran for cover. “My sister and nephew were literally cut into pieces,” her brother, still limping from leg wounds, told investigators.
- Two explosions in Al-Jumhuriya leveled mud-brick homes and a neighborhood restaurant, killing at least six adults and seven children. “When we came back, we found my family on the ground with their limbs severed,” one father said after losing his wife and three children.
Doctors Without Borders, which runs Nyala Teaching Hospital, recorded 32 deaths and dozens of injuries on Feb. 3. The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) placed the civilian toll from Feb. 2-4 between 51 and 74.
Human Rights Watch analyzed satellite imagery from March 5 to pinpoint impact craters and building damage and matched social-media videos to ground locations. Photos of metal fragments recovered beside the Mecca Eye Hospital showed tail fins from OFAB-250 and FAB-series high-explosive bombs — Soviet-designed munitions with blast radii of 150 feet (50 meters) or more.
Because such unguided bombs “cannot, under most conditions, be directed at a specific military target in populated areas,” their use in Nyala was indiscriminate and illegal under international humanitarian law, the report said.
General al-Burhan’s SAF did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Officials have previously defended bombing campaigns in Darfur as legitimate attacks on RSF positions, particularly around Nyala’s airport, which the SAF claims the RSF uses to fly drones and land cargo planes.
International law permits strikes on bona fide military objectives, but commanders must call off attacks likely to cause excessive civilian harm.
Satellite imagery reviewed by the AP shows dozens of khaki-colored tents, vehicles and earthworks inside the airport perimeter, evidence of a large RSF presence. Yet Human Rights Watch said none of the February bombs landed on or immediately adjacent to the runway.
‘The worst thing is the sky’
Survivors say the prospect of another strike hangs over Nyala daily. “When bullets fly, you can hide behind a wall,” a laborer injured on Congo Road said by phone. “But from the planes, there is no cover. The worst thing is the sky.”
Medical care is scarce. Two hospitals have shut after repeated shelling, and the remaining facilities lack trauma surgeons. Several victims told researchers they still have metal fragments embedded in their bodies because they cannot pay for surgery or because doctors have fled.
Human Rights Watch urged SAF’s air-force commander and other senior officers to halt the use of unguided bombs in urban areas. It called on foreign governments to impose asset freezes and travel bans on top military brass, following European Union sanctions announced in April.
The group also pressed Khartoum to grant visas to the U.N. Fact-Finding Mission on Sudan and International Criminal Court investigators. The ICC already has an open file on Darfur dating to atrocities committed under former dictator Omar al-Bashir.
War’s widening toll
Sudan’s conflict erupted in April 2023 when rivalry between SAF chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo boiled into open warfare in the capital, Khartoum. The fighting quickly spread west to Darfur, reigniting fears of a repeat of the 2003-05 genocide.
The United Nations says at least 14,000 civilians have died nationwide, though actual numbers are likely higher, and nearly 10 million people have been uprooted — the world’s largest displacement crisis. Aid agencies warn that famine looms in 14 of Sudan’s 18 states.
In Nyala, residents said the February airstrikes triggered yet another exodus. “We buried the children and left with nothing but clothes on our backs,” a restaurant owner who lost her 8-year-old daughter said. “How can we stay when bombs fall every day?”
Gallopin, the Human Rights Watch researcher, said the world must act before Nyala becomes “another Mariupol or Aleppo.” “Civilian suffering in Sudan has become an afterthought,” he said. “Swift, coordinated pressure on all armed actors is the only way to end these unlawful attacks.”
