The European Union (EU) imposed sanctions Thursday on the deputy leader of Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces, as the paramilitary group’s brutal war against the country’s military approaches the three-year mark and a humanitarian crisis deepens.
Abdelrahim Hamdan Dagalo, the RSF’s second-in-command, was targeted for his role in the conflict, the EU said in a statement. He is the brother of the group’s commander, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
The sanctions come amid escalating violence in the Darfur region, particularly around the city of El Fasher, which the RSF seized last month. The conflict, which erupted in April 2023 between the RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces, has created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters.
EU top diplomat Kaja Kallas condemned atrocities committed by the RSF, citing “deliberate targeting of civilians, ethnically motivated killings, systematic sexual and gender-based violence, starvation as a method of warfare and denying access for humanitarian aid.”
“These are serious breaches of international humanitarian law and international human rights law,” Kallas said.
The RSF and the Sudanese military were once allies, having jointly overthrown longtime dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019. However, a power struggle over the country’s transition to democracy plunged them into war.
The United Nations estimates the fighting has displaced about 12 million people within Sudan and into neighboring countries. While a precise death toll is unknown, experts estimate it runs into the hundreds of thousands.
The situation in Darfur has drawn particular alarm from international observers. Tom Fletcher, the U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, described the region Wednesday as “an absolute horror show” and “the epicenter of human suffering in the world.”
He said El Fasher, based on survivor testimonies, was “basically a crime scene.”
“The deliberate attacks on civilians … must stop and we want those who commit these crimes to face justice,” Fletcher said in a recorded statement.
The U.N. spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, told reporters Thursday that more than 100,000 people have fled El Fasher and its surrounding areas since the RSF took control on Oct. 26.
“Those who escaped El Fasher are arriving at displacement sites where conditions are — as you can only imagine — extremely dire and the scale of needs is massive,” Dujarric said. He added that many people remain unaccounted for.
The medical charity Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, underscored the desperate conditions in the city. In a statement on X on Thursday, the group said it screened 70 children arriving in El Fasher in a single night, and all were suffering from acute malnutrition.
“After 500 days of siege, families are eating animal feed. We need safe passage now,” the statement said.
Both sides in the conflict have been accused of war crimes, but the RSF and its allied militias have also been implicated in acts of ethnic cleansing and genocide, particularly in Darfur.
The EU statement concluded by warning that the bloc “stands ready to impose any further restrictive measure where further appropriate, on all actors responsible for destabilizing Sudan and obstructing its political transition.”