Atrocities in Sudan’s Darfur region are spreading town by town in an organized campaign that includes mass executions, rape, and ethnic targeting—amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity, the International Criminal Court prosecutor told the United Nations (UN) Security Council. ICC Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan said the situation in Darfur had “darkened even further,” with civilians facing what she described as collective torture amid widening war between Sudan’s rival military forces. The picture emerging is one of “organised, widespread, mass criminality,” with atrocities used as a tool to assert control.
Sudan has been engulfed in conflict since April 2023, when fighting broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces militia. What started as a power struggle spread across the country, hitting Darfur hardest—reigniting longstanding ethnic tensions that prompted genocide allegations in the early 2000s.
The fall of El Fasher, North Darfur’s regional capital, to the RSF was followed by a “calculated campaign of the most profound suffering,” particularly targeting non-Arab communities. Crimes include rape, arbitrary detention, executions, and the creation of mass graves, often filmed and celebrated by perpetrators. Based on video, audio, and satellite evidence, the ICC concluded that war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed in El Fasher in late October following a prolonged RSF siege.
“Members of the RSF are seen celebrating direct executions and subsequently desecrating corpses,” Khan said.
The prosecutor’s office is also investigating crimes in El Geneina, where witnesses described attacks on displacement camps, looting, gender-based violence, and crimes against children. In 2023, El Geneina saw some of the war’s worst violence as RSF fighters and allied militias carried out massacres against the Massalit community, forcing hundreds of thousands to flee into Chad. The patterns of atrocities seen there have now been replicated in El Fasher.
“This criminality is being repeated in town after town in Darfur,” Khan warned. “It will continue until this conflict, and the sense of impunity that fuels it, are stopped.”
Sexual violence, including rape, is being used as a weapon of war, with gender-based crimes remaining a priority for ICC investigations. While much of the briefing focused on RSF abuses, Khan said the ICC is also documenting allegations against the Sudanese Armed Forces. She cited the conviction last October of Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, a former Janjaweed militia leader, as progress but cautioned that ongoing atrocities far outweigh any sense of justice. She called on Sudanese authorities to act against senior suspects, including former president Omar al-Bashir.
