Drone strike on Nyala market kills over 100, Sudan group says

Nyala — More than 100 people were killed when a Sudanese military drone struck a busy market in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur province, a Sudanese rights group has said. Emergency Lawyers, which tracks violence in the country, said a further 113 people were injured in the strike on Monday evening, and that many of the dead and wounded were women and children.

The group blamed the Sudanese army for the attack and called for an independent investigation. "This massacre transformed a civilian marketplace into a scene of mass killing and injury," it said in a statement, adding that the strike "threatens the lives of residents and compounds their suffering amid the ongoing war," The Hindu reported.

Médecins Sans Frontières said 36 bodies arrived at its hospital in Nyala and that its emergency room treated 150 injured people. Nyala is controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which has been fighting the army since April 2023. Neither the army nor the RSF has publicly commented on the market strike, and the death toll could not be independently verified.

Drone warfare has defined this conflict, but recent weeks have brought what the UN describes as a sharp escalation, with both sides launching explosive-laden drones at hospitals, dams, schools, markets and displacement camps. Drone strikes are now the deadliest threat to civilians in Sudan, according to the UN.

The same pattern reached the capital this week. Much of Khartoum lost electricity for more than 12 hours on Tuesday after a drone hit the Al-Markhiyat transformer station in Omdurman; an electricity company official blamed the RSF and estimated that 60% of the capital's power supply could be affected. The state electricity company acknowledged "serious damage" and said rationing would continue until repairs are finished, without giving a date.

The war has killed at least 59,000 people, according to the conflict monitor ACLED, though aid groups say the true figure is likely higher. The UN says about 34 million people — nearly two in three Sudanese — need assistance, and the IPC food crisis monitor warned last week that greater Darfur and Kordofan are at risk of famine. More than 30 countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Commission, have jointly urged the warring parties "to lift all impediments on humanitarian assistance."

What comes next is a test of paperwork, not promises. Emergency Lawyers wants an independent investigation into the Nyala strike; no body has yet been mandated to conduct one. Watch for whether the UN or the joint statement's signatories convert their concern into a formal accountability mechanism — and whether the warring parties let investigators, or aid, in.