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A drone strike blamed on the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) killed at least 14 people, mostly women, in the Sudanese town of Al-Tina on the border with Chad, a survivor and a government official told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Tuesday.
The attack took place on Monday and targeted a gathering of women selling food and tea in the Al-Tina market, the survivor said, requesting anonymity for safety.
Locals who rushed to bury the dead “found 14 bodies at the bomb site, most of them women,” the survivor said, using a satellite internet connection to bypass a communications blackout.
A government official confirmed the attack and said authorities were still working to determine the full number of casualties.
Al-Tina, a Sudanese border town near Chad in the far west of Darfur, has faced regular RSF attacks this year.
The city is at imminent risk of famine, according to U.N. food security analysis, and thousands of people have fled across the border into Chad.
The RSF consolidated control over much of Darfur last year, but the Joint Forces, a coalition of armed groups fighting alongside Sudan’s army, continue to hold enclaves near the border, including Al-Tina.
Deadly attacks on civilian sites, including markets, are common in the war between Sudan’s army and the RSF, which began in April 2023.
The war has killed thousands of people, although an exact toll is impossible to confirm. Aid workers estimate that more than 200,000 people have been killed.
Drone warfare has become an increasingly prominent feature of the conflict, with both sides using unmanned strikes across the country while keeping depleted ground forces away from frontlines.
Between January and April, at least 880 civilians were killed in drone strikes, according to the United Nations.
Now in its fourth year, the war has caused the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises.
In North Darfur state, where Al-Tina is located, 1.7 million people are displaced and hundreds of thousands stand on the brink of starvation.
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