Sudan accuses RSF of genocide in Darfur, slams international silence

February 12, 2025 (PORT SUDAN) – Sudan’s foreign ministry on Wednesday accused the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of escalating a campaign of genocide against civilians in Darfur, backed by regional allies, and decried the international community’s silence.

The ministry said in a statement that the RSF had launched a brutal assault on the Zamzam camp for displaced people near El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, over the past two days, following months of indiscriminate artillery shelling of the camp that began in December 2024. The attacks have resulted in a large number of deaths among the displaced, the statement said.

“Amidst a disturbing international silence, the RSF, supported by its regional backers, has escalated its campaign of genocide against the majority of Darfur’s citizens,” the ministry said, in an apparent reference to the United Arab Emirates.

The ministry asserted that the RSF deliberately targeted specific tribal groups within the camp and prevented those trying to flee the violence from leaving, echoing the tactics used in attacks on Geneina and Ardamata in West Darfur in June 2023.

The RSF also burned markets and food and water storage facilities and forced the closure of primary healthcare centres in the camp, the ministry added. It reiterated previous accusations that the RSF had for weeks held up World Food Programme convoys destined for the camp before forcibly diverting them, actions it described as further evidence of genocidal intent.

The ministry said satellite imagery and documented scientific reports proved the UAE was the source of the heavy weapons and artillery used against the camp’s residents over the past three months. It also criticized the UN Security Council and Western powers for their inaction in the face of the RSF’s continued shelling of the camp and its defiance of Security Council resolutions demanding an end to the siege of El Fasher.

In a separate statement, the Sudanese army said its forces, along with allied militias and local resistance groups, had repelled the RSF attack on the Zamzam camp on Wednesday, inflicting casualties and pushing them back. It claimed the camp was now under full control and that life had returned to normal.

Darfur Governor Mini Arko Minawi separately accused the RSF of burning all belongings of the displaced in Zamzam and of setting fire to livestock after stealing what they could.