At least 460 people have been killed in El Fasher in Sudan after the Rapid Support Force (RSF) paramilitary group launched an assault on the city’s last functioning hospital.
The Saudi Maternity Hospital remained operating throughout supply shortages and frequent heavy shelling, becoming the site of bloodshed after serving as the final refuge for vulnerable patients.
Reports from the region suggest that more than 2,000 people have been killed in the last 48 hours after the group seized the city after a 18-month siege. Footage circulating online appears to show a child soldier murdering a grown man.
The massacres have drawn widespread condemnation after vast pools of blood and human bodies in the sand were visible from space in gruesome satellite images following analysis by the Yale School of Public Health Humanitarian Research Lab.
The World Health Organisation has said it was “deeply shocked” and “appalled” at the incident. Six health workers, a nurse and pharmacist were abducted from the hospital on Tuesday, according to the humanitarian organisation.
“On the same day, more than 460 patients and their companions were reportedly shot and killed in the hospital,” it said.
WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called for health facilities, health workers and patients to be protected under international law.
It marks a new escalation in the conflict, which has been raging since April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the RSF. The war has led to devastation and displacement across the region with reports of atrocities being committed. Famine and disease are said to be widespread, according to agencies.
Witnesses told the Associated Foreign Press that RSF fighters conducted sweeps of individual houses, beating and shooting people including women and children.
More than 40 per cent of the population – 24 million people – are food insecure, according to the United Nations. More than four million people have fled into neighbouring countries Chad, South Sudan and the Central African Republic.
The UN’s top relief official called on the Security Council to act with “with immediate and robust action” to stop atrocities, ensure safe humanitarian access, and halt flows of weapons fuelling the war.
“I urge colleagues to study the latest satellite imagery of El Fasher; blood on the sand. And I urge colleagues to study the world’s continued failure to stop this. Blood on the hands.”
