From dreams to ashes: A year in Sudanese cartoons by Omar Dafallah

One and a half years since the war between Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) began in Sudan, Dabanga – Radio TV Online presents you with a visual compilation of struggles for power and peace during wartime, featuring a dark and witty series from the barbed pen of Sudanese veteran cartoonist Omar Dafallah.

The year began on a sour note in Sudan, as the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) warned that the humanitarian response was insufficient for the victims of “the world’s largest displacement crisis.”

On January 20, Sudanese de facto government froze its Horn of Africa Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) membership after the organisation received RSF Commander Mohamed ‘Hemedti’ Dagalo at its summit earlier that month. One of the first cartoons of the year joked about the ‘tactical withdrawal’ of SAF troops from garrisons during battles with the RSF.

As reports of people starving to death began to emanate from Darfur in February, the warring powers tried their hands at intnernational relations. The Sudanese de facto government and Iran made amends, as Lt Gen Abdelfattah El Burhan, president of the Sovereignty Council and SAF commander-in-chief, travelled to Algeria, Libya, and Egypt. Hemedti visited Libya.

In the meantime, hopes of the Tagadom alliance meeting with the army leader to talk about a Declaration of Principles and ceasefire faded, then sparked again in March after former PM Abdalla Hamdok was invited to Cairo for talks.

So the Saudi Arabians rolled out the red carpet, in another attempt to bring together the warring parties, which failed to adopt the UN Security Council’s adoption of Resolution 2724 urging an immediate halt to hostilities in Sudan.

The Saudi-US mediation, despite managing to lure in Burhan, failed to agree on the involvement of regional parties, especially the United Arab Emirates. In an interview with Dabanga, senior fellow in the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington Cameron Hudson asked: “Is it too late for Washington to regain its lost influence?”

"Did the warrior pass by here
Like a shell in war?
Did his fragments break the teacups in the café?
I see cities made of paper armed with kings and khaki suits,
I see cities crowning their conquerors,
And the East is sometimes the opposite of the West,
And the East is sometimes the West,
With its icons and commodities.
I see cities crowning their conquerors,
And exporting martyrs to import whiskey,
And the latest inventions in sex and torture.
Did the warrior pass by here,
Like a shell in war?"

- Omar Dafallah

By May 3, the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) warned of famine in Sudan if food access did not improve. The African Centre for Justice and Peace Studies (ACJPS) issued a damning report on human rights atrocities later that month, as the RSF advanced into new territories.

The de facto government reportedly began working on a new constitutional framework for a new government in Port Sudan, as the military junta claimed to be strengthening relations with Russia and Iran.

The UN Inter-Agency Standing Committee warned that “time is running out for millions of people in Sudan” towards the end of May. Reports of mass displacement in Jebel Marra, Central Darfur, were compounded by confirmation that RSF elements had killed more than 100 people in Wad El Noura village in El Gezira.

On June 11, this prompted the International Criminal Court (ICC) to step-up its investigations into crimes committed during the war in Sudan.

Despite the ongoing documentation of humanitarian violations, extrajudicial killings, detentions, rape, bombing, and malnutrition in Sudan, news of the crisis did not seem to reach across national boundaries.

As both warring parties began accusing civilians of aligning with the opposition, the risk for those who spoke out against the war grew significantly.

Towards the end of August, new Geneva talks led to a breakthrough when the Sovereignty Council agreed to reopen the Adré crossing at the Chad-Darfur border for three months to transport much-needed aid.

That month, the Sudanese Air Forces continued to bombard residential areas, including camps for displaced people. Meanwhile, the RSF continued to attack civilians in the areas under their control. “With Sudan’s media muzzled, famine ravages a nation in the dark,” the Sudan Media Forum reported on August 23.

"How many times will you travel?
And for how long will you travel?
And for what dream?
And if you return one day, 
To what exile will you return?
To what exile will you return?"

- Omar Dafallah

In September, UN human rights experts expressed “their grave concern for the many documented cases of sexual abuse, rape, enforced prostitution, sexual slavery, kidnapping, enforced disappearances, and unlawful killings by the RSF and other armed groups.”

From January 1 to November 29, the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data organisation (ACLED) recorded 1,792 incidents of violence against civilians and 4,202 reported fatalities as a result of civilian targeting.

On December 24, the IOM estimated that 11,532,774 people were displaced in Sudan.

Despite the ongoing atrocities, reports piled in of international actors profiting from the war in Sudan, as depicted by Dafallah’s cartoon of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi escaping Sudan with a suitcase of gold. The production and trade of gold, which lies in rich deposits across the country, actually surpassed prewar levels in 2024.

The latest IPC Acute Food Insecurity Projection for Sudan, published on December 24, reported that Abu Shouk and El Salam camps for displaced people in North Darfur and parts of the Nuba Mountains are now experiencing famine. Five additional areas in North Darfur are projected to face famine within six months. 17 areas in the Nuba Mountains and parts of North and South Darfur are at significant risk of famine.

As the humanitarian crisis deepens and international aid remains crucial in halting the ongoing freefall, Dafallah’s cartoons continue to accurately depict the twists and turns along Sudan’s path to peace, which grows ever more elusive.

"And we came from a country that has no country,
We came from the hands of factions and from exhaustion...
The desolation of this land that extends,
From the prince’s palace to our cells,
And from our first dreams to… ashes"

- Omar Dafallah