Darfur: Air raids in Kutum, battles in El Fasher and Kulbus

The Sudanese Air Force launched air raids on Kutum in North Darfur yesterday. A woman was killed. No site of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) was hit. The state capital El Fasher witnessed violent clashes that lasted for hours. Fighting between the Darfur Joint Force and RSF paramilitaries was reported from Kulbus in West Darfur.

Listeners from Kutum, 120 kilometres northwest of El Fasher, told Radio Dabanga that the airstrikes targeted the town, at around 10:30. Nine bombardments hit the town’s weekly market and the El Salama, Kamfout and El Gasir neighbourhoods.

A woman was killed in the El Salama neighbourhood and six people visiting the market were injured.

“The bombing led to panic in the market. Traders and customers alike left their goods, and fled the place,” one of the sources said. No Rapid Support Forces (RSF) target was hit.

The sources expressed their fear that the market will be closed in the coming weeks as more air raids are expected. “This will harm those who depend on the market to sell their agricultural products and those who buy their food there,” they warned.

The RSF took control of Kutum in early June.

El Fasher, Kulbus

The North Darfur capital again witnessed violent battles yesterday evening. The fighting between the army, supported by the Darfur Joint Force and the RSF lasted for three hours in the southern and eastern parts of the city.

Both sides used heavy weapons and drones.

Minni Minawi, governor of Darfur region and head of a Sudan Liberation Movement faction participating in the Darfur joint protection force, claimed in a post on X yesterday that they inflicted large losses to the RSF in El Fasher and in Kulbus, the most northern locality of West Darfur.

In El Fasher, “the enemy suffered heavy losses and left behind a number of dead and spoils,” he stated.

Social media users loyal to the Darfur Joint Force made up of rebel fighters reported the joint force’s control over Jebel Awoum, which lies between the towns of Kulbus and Selea along the border with Chad, about 50 kilometres from the capital of West Darfur, El Geneina.

Basha Tabig, advisor to the RSF commander, however, said on X that the RSF paramilitaries were able to repel combatants of the Darfur Joint Force in the Jebel Awoum area, “inflicting losses in lives and equipment”.