PORT SUDAN: Hundreds of families fled a northern suburb of Sudan’s capital Khartoum on Saturday after fighting between the army and paramilitaries intensified around a key military base, witnesses told AFP. The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces attacked the Hattab base in Khartoum North, also known as Bahri, on Wednesday.

The army, led by de facto ruler Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, is locked in conflict with the RSF led by his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo. The war began in April 2023 and has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

“Since this morning, the army has been firing artillery towards the south of Hattab while military planes are flying over” the area, one witness told AFP on Saturday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Nasr el-Din, a resident who asked that only his first name be used for security reasons, said the RSF “attacked houses south (of the Hattab base), capturing citizens and killing others”.

“Since early morning, hundreds of families have left for the north, carrying their belongings on their heads”, he added in an account corroborated by another witness. UN experts on Friday called for the deployment of an “independent and impartial force” to protect millions of civilians driven from their homes in Sudan. After an independent fact-finding mission mandated by the Human Rights Council, the UN experts said “harrowing” violations by both sides had been uncovered, “which may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity”.

Meanwhile more than 25 million people — upwards of half Sudan’s population — face acute hunger, with full-blown famine declared in a camp for displaced people in the volatile western region of Darfur. World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Saturday began a two-day visit to Port Sudan, the de facto seat of government after fighting forced the authorities out of Khartoum. He met a health minister and will also meet other officials and visit health facilities, an AFP correspondent on the ground reported. — AFP