Sudan Rights Group Documents Executions, Mass Detention in Kadugli, South Kordofan

A Sudanese rights group, the Nuba Mountains Observatory for Human Rights, has documented executions and mass detention in South Kordofan, with its update focusing on Kadugli locality.

“In a video posted on social media, a Sudanese soldier drags a man whose leg is broken into a ditch on the outskirts of the city of Omdurman and finishes him off”

Africa Defense Forum

The Observatory said it documented 228 inmates and detainees from Nuba civilians held in prisons, police stations, and military and security detention centres in Kadugli locality, South Kordofan.

Africa Defense Forum

It reported that the detainees include 159 men, 28 women, and three minors under the age of 17.

In its most recent update published on Wednesday, the Observatory said Kadugli Prison holds 187 detainees, while a further 19 detainees are held in police stations, including three women.

The Observatory said 22 detainees are in the custody of security and military intelligence, including four held by the Security and Intelligence Service and 18 by military intelligence.

It also reported the execution of nine detainees between January 6 and April 3, 2026.

The Observatory accused military intelligence, the security service, and a security cell, alongside irregular groups, of carrying out arrest campaigns based on suspected cooperation with the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement or the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

It added that it will publish further updates covering other areas of South Kordofan and plans to complete monitoring in other states such as Khartoum, White Nile, El Gezira, and Red Sea by the end of the month.

As fighting continues between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, the Council of the European Union has warned that the war is devastating civilians and has renewed calls for an immediate ceasefire.

In a statement published on Tuesday, the EU said the conflict is “destroying lives and depriving the population of its aspirations of the 2018/19 revolution”.

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The bloc reaffirmed its support for Sudan’s unity, stating it “strongly rejects any unilateral attempt to establish parallel governance that could risk the partition of the country”.

It renewed its call for an end to the fighting, urging all parties to engage in “negotiations towards an immediate and lasting ceasefire”, and said it “stands ready to back any credible, unified peace initiative”.

The EU also stressed that “external actors must stop fuelling the war”.

The statement warned that the humanitarian crisis is worsening, saying “civilians are targeted, famine conditions persist, and displacement continues to destabilise communities and the region”.

It added that “attacks on civilians, healthcare, aid workers, humanitarian convoys and civilian infrastructure must stop”, and that obstruction of aid “may constitute war crimes”.

At a conference in Berlin on 15 April, donors pledged €1.5 billion in aid, including €812 million from the EU and its member states, as the EU said “only an independent and representative civilian process can restore legitimacy of the Sudanese state”.

A separate account of Sudan’s third year of war describes a conflict without a clear way out and frames the scale of displacement and hunger as continuing to worsen.

“(Nairobi) – In Sudan, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), as well as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and allied fighters, have extrajudicially executed, tortured, and mistreated detainees, and mutilated corpses, according to Human Rights Watch today”

Human Rights Watch

RFI says the war broke out in April 2023 and remains without a clear way out of the crisis three years later, with the two rival military factions continuing to clash.

It identifies the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who has been in power since the October 2021 coup, and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by General Mohammed Hamdan Daglo, aka Hemetti.

RFI reports that “According to estimates, the conflict has already killed nearly 150,000 people” and that “Nearly two-thirds of the Sudanese population now needs urgent humanitarian aid”.

It says famine has been reported in at least five regions of the country and gives a displacement figure: “In total, nearly 13 million people have been forcibly displaced since April 2023”.

RFI adds that “one in three Sudanese has been uprooted” and that the displaced include “8.6 million inside the country and more than 4 million refugees in neighboring countries”.

The report also describes how violence intensified after the RSF took the town of El-Fasher in the fall, and it states that “Since the RSF seized El-Fasher in North Darfur on October 26, violence has intensified further”.

It further cites the Sudanese Doctors Network saying “about 5,000 civilians are detained by the paramilitaries in the city of Nyala”.

Human Rights Watch says both the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces have executed detainees, tortured them, and mutilated corpses, and it frames the abuses as war crimes requiring credible investigations.

In a statement from Nairobi, HRW said “the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), as well as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and allied fighters, have extrajudicially executed, tortured, and mistreated detainees, and mutilated corpses”.

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HRW said the leaders of both forces should “order, privately and publicly, an immediate stop to these abuses and conduct credible investigations” and should “fully cooperate with international investigators, including those from the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Sudan”.

HRW’s Mohamed Osman said the forces appear “so shielded from sanctions that they have filmed themselves repeatedly carrying out executions, torturing and dehumanizing detainees, and mutilating bodies”.

HRW analyzed “20 videos and 1 photograph from 10 incidents posted on social media platforms between August 24, 2023 and July 11, 2024”.

It reported that “Eight videos and one photograph show four incidents of extrajudicial executions, including mass executions of at least 40 people”.

HRW said “Four videos show acts of torture and ill-treatment inflicted on a total of 18 detainees” and that “nine show the mutilation of at least eight corpses”.

It also described specific execution incidents, including “the execution of at least 21 men in El Fula, in West Kordofan, in June 2024” and “the execution of at least 14 men following RSF attacks on Belila airport, 60 kilometers southeast of El Fula, in West Kordofan in October 2023”.

Other reporting on Sudan’s battlefield abuses describes a pattern of executions and desecration tied to territorial changes, while also pointing to the lack of consequences after earlier incidents.

“Sudan: after three years of war, what hopes for 2026”

RFI

Africa Defense Forum says a video posted on social media shows “a Sudanese soldier drags a man whose leg is broken into a ditch on the outskirts of the city of Omdurman and finishes him off,” and it adds that the soldier “uses a long knife to cut off the man's head while his companions applaud.”

RFI

It says these incidents are part of allegations that members of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and their allied militias commit war crimes as they push to reconquer territory formerly seized by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

Africa Defense Forum states that after reconquering Khartoum and Omdurman from the RSF in March, Sudanese soldiers and allied militiamen hunted for people from Darfur and the Nuba, as well as South Sudanese residents of Khartoum, and killed them, citing the Sudan War Monitor.

It quotes Monitor researchers writing that “War crimes of this kind have taken place since the start of the war, but the number of victims has risen recently as large swathes of territory change hands,” and it says the beheading in Omdurman was the second such act committed by SAF soldiers and verified by Monitor researchers since the start of the civil war.

The outlet says that in 2024, Sudanese soldiers had beheaded two civilians and that “After this incident, the Sudanese army said it would conduct an investigation, but no action or arrests related to the investigation were announced,” according to Monitor researchers.

Human Rights Watch, meanwhile, said the leaders of both forces should “conduct credible investigations” and “fully cooperate with international investigators,” including those from the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Sudan.

HRW also said that “Council members should renew the mission's mandate at the Council's September session,” linking the next step to UN oversight.