Bottom Line Up Front
The conflict in Sudan has seen indiscriminate bombings, extrajudicial executions, and the use of starvation as a weapon of war and yet despite this, has remained on the back pages, overtaken by attention on Gaza and the war in Ukraine.
Before leaving office, the Biden administration and the U.S. Treasury Department announced sanctions against both sides in the conflict—the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudanese Armes Forces (SAF), led by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.
Numerous external actors have been parties to the conflict, fueling their respective proxies with financing, weapons, and logistical support.
With a new administration taking power in the United States, there is renewed hope that Washington and other countries wielding influence in Sudan will dedicate resources toward a negotiated settlement that ends the ongoing violence.
The situation in Sudan continues to deteriorate, with the country’s civil war approaching its two-year mark in mid-April. Despite that, and the fact that more than 150,000 people have been killed, 11 million Sudanese have been displaced, and another 26 million are facing acute food shortages, the conflict has remained on the back pages, overtaken by attention on Gaza and the war in Ukraine. The country of more than 48 million people is mired in the throes of state collapse, with the potential for violence, migration, and illicit smuggling and trafficking likely to continue spilling over into neighboring countries, further destabilizing the region. More than one million people have fled to South Sudan since the war began in April 2023. The conflict has seen indiscriminate bombings, extrajudicial executions, and the use of starvation as a weapon of war. Famine conditions were confirmed in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur based in the western part of Sudan. Camps for internally displaced persons are particularly vulnerable.
In early January, before leaving office, the Biden administration accused the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary outfit led by the notorious warlord ‘Hemedti,’ or Mohammad Hamdan Daglo Mousa of genocide. In turn, the U.S. announced visa restrictions against Hemedti and his family members, banning them from traveling to the United States. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced, when speaking to the U.S. finding of the RSF’s complicity in genocide, “The United States does not support either side of this war, and these actions against Hemedti and the RSF do not signify support or favor for the SAF,” in reference to the Sudanese Armed Forces, led by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. Blinken went on to say, “Both belligerents bear responsibility for the violence and suffering in Sudan and lack the legitimacy to govern a future peaceful Sudan.”
The U.S. Treasury Department announced last week that it was also sanctioning Burhan, who was accused of ordering the use of chemical weapons on two separate occasions against the RSF. For its part, the RSF and its allied militias have been accused of a brutal massacre in El Geneina, the capital of Western Darfur; forced recruitment in Gezira state; and an active campaign to enslave men and women in Darfur, the site of another genocide in the early 2000s, when hundreds of thousands of people lost their lives. For some, the sanctions are viewed as largely symbolic and for others, too little, too late. As Africa scholar Cameron Hudson recently commented in an interview with the Voice of America, the Biden administration’s approach to Sudan has been “moralistic” but not “practical.” Given the timing of the sanctions, just weeks before Biden left office, it was clear that these actions were not part of any broader strategy, nor was it possible that, divorced from actual policy objectives, they could have much of an impact on the violence and/or humanitarian suffering in Sudan.
Numerous external actors have been parties to the conflict, fueling their respective proxies with financing, weapons, and logistical support. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has backed the RSF, while Egypt has been a supporter of the SAF. The Russians and the Saudis have attempted to play both sides, in an effort to jockey for position in parallel with the winning side. Moscow is seeking to gain access to the Port of Sudan through a potential agreement with the SAF, while its mercenaries from the Africa Corps (formerly Wagner Group) work with the RSF and alongside the UAE, hedging the Kremlin’s bets. The conflict has certainly made for strange bedfellows, with Iran also supplying the SAF with weapons, including drones.
The Biden administration was reluctant to name and shame the UAE for its meddling in the conflict, and it remains to be seen how the Trump administration will approach the situation in Sudan. For the UAE, Sudan is an important geopolitical interest, as Abu Dhabi’s influence in the country helps facilitate gold smuggling from Sudan to Russia, which has doubled down on its pursuit of natural resources to help cushion the blow from sanctions levied against Moscow following its brutal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
The conflict in Sudan has ebbed and flowed, but it mostly settled into a mutually hurting stalemate with both sides able to inflict damage on the other, without being able to muster enough force to claim a decisive victory. Just this month, the SAF has made strides against the RSF, reclaiming Wad Madani, the capital of Gezira state. At the same time, the RSF has advanced in White Nile and Blue Nile states, which border South Sudan and Ethiopia respectively.
A complicating factor is that the war in Sudan is one of several overlapping crises in East Africa where external actors are closely involved. There are growing tensions over the future of Somaliland, with Ethiopia and the UAE arrayed against Türkiye and Egypt and lingering issues related to the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), which pits Ethiopia against Sudan and Egypt, a dispute that the UAE has offered to mediate.
At various points, Türkiye has offered to mediate the conflict in Sudan, while Saudi Arabia has also attempted to convene countries in Geneva. To date, these efforts have floundered and the SAF has remained reticent to move forward with diplomatic solutions, believing instead that it can win on the battlefield. With a new administration taking power in the United States, there is renewed hope that Washington and other countries wielding influence in Sudan will dedicate resources toward a negotiated settlement that ends the ongoing violence. Yet to be sure, there are some countries and non-state actors which maintain a vested interest in seeing the fighting continue.