Author: Nafisa Eltahir and Khalid Abdelaziz
Feb 3 – Sudan’s army said it broke a years-long siege of the city of Kadugli on Tuesday, potentially lifting tens of thousands of people out of famine and marking a shift in momentum in the war.
Since it broke out in April 2023, the conflict between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has displaced millions of people, attracted regional powers, and triggered a huge humanitarian crisis.
Its latest frontline is the Greater Kordofan region, where MSF troops began sweeping in after the rainy season ended late last year.
“With God’s help and guidance, the Sudanese Armed Forces and supporting forces successfully opened the Kadugli-Dalanji road after heroic battles,” the Sudanese army said in a statement.
Doctors Without Borders did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Kadugli and nearby Dharangi have been under siege on and off since the war began. Fighting escalated last year after the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, which controls territory in the state and elsewhere, joined forces with Doctors Without Borders.
Last week, the army broke the siege of Dharangi.
‘Great, uncontrolled suffering’
Residents say the Global Hunger Monitor confirmed last year that the siege of Kadugli was causing famine, while civilians in both cities have been subject to devastating drone attacks that have continued since the siege was lifted.
Jan Egeland, chairman of the Norwegian Refugee Council, said he had witnessed first-hand the “enormous and uncontrolled suffering” of people who fled Kadugli to the SPLM-North refugee camps.
“These mothers have a recurring story,” he told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday. “People are running for their lives after months of starvation as drones attack their burned-out homes,” Egeland said.
Similar accounts have been given by people fleeing the siege of El Fasher, which fell to SSF in October.
Few aid agencies are still active in Kadugli or elsewhere in South Kordofan. The siege has caused prices to rise, with a kilogram of flour reaching 80,000 Sudanese pounds (about $22), according to local aid workers.
Aid workers say this has left many people unable to buy food and forced to eat leaves, while medicines and doctors are scarce.
According to the United Nations, more than 80% of Kadugli’s population, about 147,000 people, have fled.
Drones drive progress
A military source and a Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North source told Reuters that MSF’s supply lines from Libya to the Kordofan region collapsed, helping the army advance.
Reuters reported on Monday that Egypt has deployed drones at an airport near its borders with Sudan and Libya, in what experts and officials said was a sign of Egypt’s deepening involvement in Sudan. Libya’s Kufra Airport, the main channel for supplies to Doctors Without Borders, announced on January 16 that it would be closed for a month for renovations, but airport officials denied that this was related to the war in Sudan.
Egypt has not yet acknowledged supporting the army militarily but says its national security is directly linked to Sudan’s.
Two sources said the army’s advance was largely achieved through drone strikes and recent recruitment of allied armed groups from local Nuba tribes.
Egeland said the shifting front lines of the war had done little to alleviate civilian suffering and efforts for a U.S.-led solution had failed.
“Peaceful diplomacy has failed to stop armed, ruthless people from doing whatever they want to civilians, starving them before they attack,” he said.
(Editing by Aidan Lewis)
