Drone Attack in Sudan’s Darfur Claimed The Lives Of Six Children And Other Victims

Twelve civilians were murdered in a drone strike on the paramilitary-controlled village of Kutum in the North Darfur province of Sudan, including six children, a medical source and local activists said on Thursday.

The attack on Wednesday coincides with a rise in drone assaults by both Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which have been at war since April 2023. A medical source told AFP that those brought to the hospital in Kutum included 12 dead, among them six children, including three female secondary school students.

Sixteen others were injured, including women and children, and are receiving treatment, the source added, speaking on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.

The pro-democracy El-Fasher Resistance Committee said that the army was responsible for the attack, which occurred in the Al-Salama neighborhood next to Al-Um Girls’ School. The United Nations reported last week that between January and mid-March, drone attacks had killed over 500 civilians, warning of “the devastating impact of high-tech and relatively cheap weapons in populated areas.”

Tens of thousands of people have died in the battle, which is almost three years old, displaced more than 11 million people and created what the UN describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis.