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Sudan Paramilitary Drone Strikes Cause Widespread Power Outages
Confirmed
In Short: Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) launched a coordinated drone attack on Monday, targeting five power stations in the eastern states, resulting in widespread power outages, according to a government official who spoke to AFP.
The drone strikes hit two power stations each in the states of Al-Jazira and Gedaref, and one in White Nile state, leading to power outages across large parts of these regions.
A 54-year-old farmer, Abdelhafez Daafallah, told AFP that the electricity had just started to improve three months ago, and the power station that was destroyed had just been repaired, leaving farmers without irrigation pumps.
In Al-Jazira’s Al-Junaid town, a farmer expressed hope that the irrigation pumps would finally start running again, but the drone attack dashed those hopes.
The conflict between the Sudanese regular army and the RSF has escalated, with the war erupting in April 2023 due to a power struggle between the leaders of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitaries.
The ongoing conflict has caused unprecedented inflation and a currency in freefall, with the Sudanese pound losing over 25 percent of its value in recent weeks.
In addition to the power outages, the RSF drone strikes have killed at least 100 people in Khartoum and other areas since Sunday, according to residents, medical workers, and paramilitary sources.
The Sudanese military has lifted a curfew and state of emergency in Khartoum, but the conflict continues to spread to other regions, including southeastern Blue Nile state near the border with Ethiopia.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation condemned the attack on villages in North Kordofan, where the death toll from a paramilitary RSF attack has risen to at least 58.
The United Nations has reported that 33.7 million people in Sudan urgently need aid this year, with 17.3 million children in need and an estimated 825,000 children facing severe acute malnutrition.
The high upfront cost of imported solar energy systems and a depreciating local currency are hindering Sudan's transition to clean energy, despite the country's potential to generate solar power given its long hours of sunshine.
A rights group reported that a drone strike hit a gathering of displaced people on the border with Ethiopia, killing 41 civilians.
The RSF's actions have raised fears of a prolonged and fragmented conflict, with violence spreading to new areas and causing significant humanitarian crises.
What this adds
The conflict shows no signs of abating despite US-led peace efforts.
What's confirmed
- Khartoum: Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces launched a coordinated drone attack Monday against five power stations, causing mass power outages across the country’s east, a government official told AFP.
- Electricity has been cut for days at a time after past paramilitary drone strikes on power stations and hydroelectric dams, compounding the suffering of nearly 20 million people facing extreme hunger.
- CAIRO (AP) — A drone strike blamed on Sudan’s notorious paramilitaries hit a gathering of displaced people on the border with Ethiopia and killed 41, a rights group said.
- Across Sudan, 33.7 million people, including 17.3 million children, urgently need aid this year, and an estimated 825,000 children face severe acute malnutrition.
What's still developing
- The conflict between the Sudanese regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has become one of the deadliest in Africa for civilians and shows no sign of abating despite US-led peace efforts.
- "I heard an explosion at 2:00 am (0000 GMT) then saw flames coming from the direction of the station," city resident Awad Ali told AFP.
- To the east, in Gedaref, Ibrahim Mohammed, 37, a grocer, said he was “already facing power cuts for hours before the strike”.
- A unit of Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) surrendered to the army on Friday, handing over its personnel and full military equipment, according to the state-run Sudan News Agency (SUNA).
- The agency said the force belonged to the RSF’s “Group 26” but did not specify the number of fighters involved or the type of equipment surrendered.
- The authorities are taking this step 18 months after the army seized back control of the capital from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which it has been fighting in a civil war now in its fourth year.
- In eastern Sudan, a military source said on Sunday that air defenses also intercepted several RSF drones targeting the Atbara and Setit dams in Gadaref state, about 420 kilometers east of Khartoum.
- “We are suffering big time,” said al-Mansour, who lives with her three children in Omdurman, just outside the capital of Khartoum.
- Chad’s army said the strikes took place more than 100km (62 miles) inside its territory in the eastern Ennedi region, and that there were no Chadian casualties.
- A drone strike hit a market in central Sudan on Saturday, killing 11 civilians and wounding dozens more, a rights group said, as escalating aerial attacks deepen the toll of one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.
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