Sudan: Last hospital in North Darfur’s capital closed after paramilitary attack | Sudan

The last functioning hospital in El Fasher, Darfur, in western Sudan, has been closed after an attack by paramilitaries trying to take over the key town, according to medical aid group Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). has said.

For more than a year, war has been raging between the regular army under army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.

El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur state, is the only state capital in the vast western region not under RSF control and a key humanitarian hub for a region on the brink of famine.

“On Saturday, MSF and the Ministry of Health suspended all activities at the Southern Hospital in El Fasher, North Darfur, after RSF soldiers stormed the facility, opened fire and looted it, including stealing a MSF ambulance,” said a MSF statement posted on X late Sunday.

Clashes have occurred in El Fasher since the war broke out in April 2023, but fierce fighting flared up again on May 10. UN Secretary-General António Guterres described this as a “worrying new chapter” in the conflict.

Since then, according to a conservative estimate by the medical aid organization, “at least 192 people have been killed and more than 1,230 injured” in the city.

Doctors Without Borders said the evacuation of the hospital was due to “intensified fighting” around the hospital earlier this week. At the time of the paramilitary attack, there were “only ten patients and a reduced medical team” there.

“Most of the patients and the remaining medical team … managed to escape the RSF gunfire,” MSF added, noting that “due to the chaos, our team was unable to determine whether there were any deaths or injuries in the latest attack.”

Michel-Olivier Lacharité, head of emergency care at Doctors Without Borders, said it was “outrageous that RSF opened fire in the hospital”.

“The warring parties must stop their attacks on medical care,” he added. “Hospitals are being closed. The remaining facilities can no longer accommodate the masses of victims.”

According to UN experts, the war in Sudan has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people, including up to 15,000 in a single town in West Darfur. Almost nine million people have been displaced from their homes.

Both sides are accused of war crimes, including targeted attacks on civilians, indiscriminate shelling of residential areas and blocking humanitarian aid. Human rights groups and the US also accuse the paramilitaries of ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.