While global attention remains focused on conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and Iran, Sudan continues to endure one of the world’s most severe humanitarian catastrophes, largely overlooked by the international community.
Since hostilities erupted in April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), over 14 million people have been displaced and nearly 34 million require urgent humanitarian aid—representing 10% of global needs, according to the International Rescue Committee.
“The war in Sudan has caused the world’s largest humanitarian crisis and has escalated into a regional conflict involving all of its neighbors as well as numerous Middle Eastern powers,” said Alan Boswell, Project Director for the Horn of Africa at the International Crisis Group. “Despite this, world leaders continue to ignore the conflict, leaving it to subordinates. That approach continues to fail.”
Women and children queue to receive free food being distributed in al-Mohayra camp for displaced people, near the city of El-Obeid in the southern Kordofan region, on June 29, 2026. (AFP via Getty Images)
The United Nations reports that approximately 19.5 million people are facing acute hunger, while 4.5 million have fled the country as refugees.
The U.S. government recently imposed additional sanctions on the Sudanese Armed Forces over allegations of chemical weapons use in 2024, violating the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Sudanese government has denied these accusations.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has prioritized diplomatic efforts in other global hotspots, including mediating between Russia and Ukraine and working to end Israel’s war in Gaza. It is also attempting to maintain a fragile ceasefire with Iran following tensions that began on February 28.
“For three years, we have warned that Sudan was on the brink of catastrophe, and those warnings have gone unanswered,” said Richard Data, International Rescue Committee Country Director.
Members of Sudanese Armed Popular Resistance Force take part in a military parade for fresh graduates, in Al-Qadarif state, in eastern Sudan on May 20, 2026. (AFP via Getty Images)
The civil war began when long-time allies turned rivals—Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, head of the SAF, and Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, leader of the RSF—clashed militarily. Their alliance had previously overseen a series of coups, including the 2019 ousting of dictator Omar al-Bashir and a 2021 coup that ended the transitional civilian government.
Both sides have been accused of serious human rights violations, though recent reports highlight particularly grave abuses by the RSF, including mass killings and sexual violence.
El-Obeid in North Kordofan has emerged as a critical hotspot, where over 100,000 displaced individuals struggle with worsening food insecurity. “What we need to do is really now to plan for the scale-up beyond the 100,000 people that we have been supporting,” said World Food Programme Sudan Country Director Abdallah Alwardat.
Members of the Sudanese army’s Special Mission Forces battalion in the Northern State hold a parade in Karima city on May 19, 2024. (AFP via Getty Images)
In El Fasher, capital of the Darfur region, the RSF seized control in October 2025, killing more than 6,000 civilians during the initial siege. A July report from the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights documented widespread sexual violence, including cases involving girls as young as 12, with reports of mass and gang rapes committed by RSF forces.
Survivors have also reported abductions, describing how women and girls were bound, beaten, and forcibly taken away in vehicles.
Sudanese displaced people gather at the Zam Zam refugee camp outside the town of El-Fashir in the Darfur region of Sudan, during a visit by U.N. officials, on July 1, 2004. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo, File)
The UN and human rights organizations have found that the RSF has carried out ethnically targeted attacks and met key criteria for genocide, including deliberately inflicting conditions meant to destroy groups in whole or in part. A separate UN report from September 2025 revealed that the SAF has also committed war crimes, targeting civilians and infrastructure based on perceived affiliations with the enemy.
