Bamako, Mali — Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger will soon launch new biometric passports, Mali’s military leader Colonel Assimi Goita said Sunday, as the junta-led states look to solidify their alliance after splitting from regional bloc ECOWAS.

The three Sahel nations, all under military rule following a string of coups since 2020, joined together last September under the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), after severing ties with former colonial ruler France and pivoting toward Russia.

They then said in January that they were turning their backs on the Economic Community of West African States — an organization they accused of being manipulated by France.

In July, the allies consolidated their ties with the creation of a Confederation of Sahel States which will be chaired by Mali in its first year and groups some 72 million people.

“In the coming days, a new biometric passport of the AES will be put into circulation with the aim of harmonizing travel documents in our common area,” Goita said during a televised address late Sunday.

“We will be working to put in place the infrastructure needed to strengthen the connectivity of our territories through transport, communications networks and information technology,” he said.

The announcement came a day before the three states are due to mark the one-year anniversary of the alliance’s creation.

The neighbors are all battling jihadi violence that erupted in northern Mali in 2012 and spread to Niger and Burkina Faso in 2015.

The unrest is estimated to have killed thousands and displaced millions across the region.
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Conakry — Guinea has handed over a plot of land to thousands forcibly evicted by previous governments, with some of the victims having waited more than 25 years for compensation.  

More than 20,000 people were displaced when the government of former president Alpha Conde demolished the Kaporo-Rails, Kipe 2, Dimesse, and Dar Es Salam neighborhoods of the capital Conakry between February and May 2019, according to Human Rights Watch.  

The government said the land belonged to the state and would be used for official buildings.  

A previous round of demolitions took place in the same area of Conakry in 1998, under the rule of president Lansana Conte.   

At a jubilant ceremony on Saturday, the associations representing the victims received the land deeds for a 258-hectare (638-acre) plot in Wonkifong, some 60 kilometers (40 miles) from Conakry, an AFP journalist saw.  

The land will be managed by the state-owned company SONAPI, which will be responsible for developing the site and rehousing the victims.  

“We are taking a concrete step towards healing the wounds of the past for 2,683 households, while laying the foundations for a shared future,” the managing director of SONAPI, Maimouna Laure Mah Barry, said in a statement.   

The spokesman for the victims, Samba Sow, said the event marked “the reparation of a 26-year-old injustice for those who were evicted in 1998 and five years for those evicted in 2019.”  

“Thousands of homes, schools, markets and places of worship were destroyed in flagrant violation of the laws of our country. The lives of several thousand families have been destroyed,” he added.  

Sow called on current head of state, junta leader General Mamady Doumbouya, to set up a compensation fund for the victims.   

The ceremony was attended by General Amara Camara, a junta spokesman, who said the president was “resolutely committed to drying the tears of all the sons and daughters of this country.”  

The West African state has been ruled by a military junta led by Doumbouya since a coup in September 2021 toppled civilian president Conde. 
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JOHANNESBURG — Thethiwe Mahlangu woke early on a chilly morning and walked through her busy South African township, where minibuses hooted to pick up commuters and smoke from sidewalk breakfast stalls hung in the air.

Her eyes had been troubling her. But instead of going to her nearby health clinic, Mahlangu was headed to the train station for an unusual form of care.

A passenger train known as Phelophepa — or “good, clean, health” in the Sesotho language — had been transformed into a mobile health facility. It circulates throughout South Africa for much of the year, providing medical attention to the sick, young and old who often struggle to receive the care they need at crowded local clinics.

For the past 30 years — ever since South Africa’s break with the former racist system of apartheid — the train has carried doctors, nurses and optometrists on an annual journey that touches even the most rural villages, delivering primary health care to about 375,000 people a year.

The free care it delivers is in contrast to South Africa’s overstretched public health care system on which about 84% of people rely.

Health care reflects the deep inequality of the country at large. Just 16% of South Africans are covered by health insurance plans that are beyond the financial reach of many in a nation with unemployment of over 32%.

Earlier this year, the government began to address that gap. President Cyril Ramaphosa in May signed into law the National Health Insurance Act, which aims to provide funding so that millions of South Africans without health insurance can receive care from the better-provisioned private sector.

But the law has been divisive. The government has not said how much it will cost and where the money will come from. Economists say the government will have to raise taxes. Critics say the country can’t afford it and warn that the system — yet to be implemented — will be open to abuse by corrupt officials and businessmen. They say the government should fix the public health care system instead.

For Mahlangu and others who look to the train for a rare source of free treatment, the situation at local health clinics is one of despair.

Long lines, shortages of medicines and rude nurses are some of the challenges at the clinics that cater for thousands of patients a day in Tembisa, east of Johannesburg.

“There we are not treated well,” Mahlangu said. “We are made to sit in the sun for long periods. You can sit there from 7 a.m. until around 4 p.m. when the clinic closes. When you ask, they say we must go ask the president to build us a bigger hospital.”

The health train has grown from a single three-carriage operation over the years to two 16-carriage trains. They are run by the Transnet Foundation, a social responsibility arm of Transnet, the state-owned railway company.

When the train began in 1994, many Black people in South Africa still lived in rural villages with little access to health facilities. It was a period of change in the country. The train began as an eye clinic, but it soon became clear that needs were greater than that.

Now both trains address the booming population of South Africa’s capital of Pretoria and nearby Johannesburg, the country’s economic hub. One would spend two weeks in Tembisa alone.

“The major metros are really struggling,” said Shemona Kendiah, the train’s manager.

But the traveling clinic is far from the solution to South Africa’s health care problems.

Public health expert Alex van den Heever said there have been substantial increases in the health care budget and the public sector employment of nurses and doctors since the country’s first democratic government in 1994. The health department’s budget in Gauteng province, which includes Pretoria and Johannesburg, has grown from 6 billion rand ($336 million) in 2000 to 65 billion ($3.6 billion) rand now.

But van den Heever accused the African National Congress, the ruling party since the end of apartheid, of allowing widespread corruption to undermine the public sector, including the health care system.

“This has led to a rapid deterioration of performance,” he said.

For South Africans who have witnessed the decline firsthand, it can be a relief when the health train pulls into town.

Mahlangu — with her new pair of glasses — was among hundreds who walked away satisfied with its services and already longing for the train’s return next year.

Another patient, Jane Mabuza, got a full health checkup along with dental services. She said she hoped the train would reach many other people.

“Here on the train, you never hear that anything has been finished,” she said.
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ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigerian troops have rescued 13 hostages who were kidnapped by an extremist group in the northwestern state of Kaduna, the country’s army said on Saturday. 

The army said in a statement that “the troops successfully overwhelmed the terrorists, forcing them to abandon their captives.” 

Several kidnappers were killed, and others were captured, the military added. It didn’t specify which armed group the kidnappers belonged to. 

The rescued hostages were taken to a military facility for a medical assessment before being reunited with their families. Weapons, ammunition, solar panels and cash were also discovered during the rescue operation. 

Kidnappings have become common in parts of northern Nigeria, where dozens of armed groups take advantage of a limited security presence to carry out attacks in villages and along major roads. Most victims are released only after the payment of ransoms that sometimes run into the thousands of dollars. 

At least 1,400 students have been taken from Nigerian schools since the 2014 kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls by Boko Haram militants in the village of Chibok in Borno state shocked the world. 

Boko Haram, Nigeria’s homegrown jihadi rebels, launched its insurgency in 2009 to establish Islamic Shariah law in the country. At least 35,000 people have been killed and 2.1 million people displaced due to the extremist violence, according to United Nations agencies in Nigeria.  
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Port Sudan, Sudan — Heavy fighting on Saturday shook a Sudanese city besieged by paramilitaries, witnesses told AFP, as U.S. researchers reported unprecedented and escalating combat in the North Darfur state capital.

El-Fasher is one of five state capitals in Sudan’s western Darfur region and the only one not in the hands of the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, who have been battling the regular army since April 2023.

The United Nations says the war across much of Sudan has created the world’s largest displacement crisis, with millions uprooted, and has led to famine at a displacement camp near El-Fasher.

Darfur has seen some of the war’s worst atrocities, and the RSF has besieged El-Fasher since May.

“Neighborhoods are completely deserted and all you can hear are explosions and missiles,” Ibrahim Ishaq, 52, told AFP.

“The central market area has become unlivable because of the intensity of the explosions,” said Ishaq, who fled westward from the city on Friday.

Witnesses reported army bombardment south and east of the city on Saturday and said they heard air-defense batteries firing.

The Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab said in a report Friday that its analysis confirmed “unprecedented large-scale combat operations” in El-Fasher within the previous 10 days, “with significant escalation in the past 36 hours” involving the army and the paramilitaries.

It cited reports that describe “a major multidirectional RSF attack from the northern, eastern, and southern directions” on Thursday.

Reduced to rubble

Darfur Governor Mini Minawi had on Thursday said on social media platform X that the army had repelled “a large attack” by the RSF. The paramilitaries, however, said they seized military sites in El-Fasher.

Using satellite imagery and other data, the Yale researchers said they found munition impacts “likely related to high-tempo aerial bombardment” from the regular army, but they said other structural damage resulted from “RSF bombardment” and combat activity by both sides.

Whatever the battle’s ultimate outcome, current levels of fighting “are likely to effectively reduce what is left of El-Fasher to rubble,” the Yale study said.

The United States special envoy for Sudan, Tom Perriello, on Saturday said on social media platform X: “We are extremely concerned about the RSF’s renewed attacks.”

He urged the RSF “to stop its assault.”

It was not immediately possible to determine the number of victims.

Sudan’s war has already killed tens of thousands of people, with some estimates as high as 150,000, according to Perriello.

Strikes near Khartoum

In the capital, Khartoum, on Saturday, about 800 kilometers from El-Fasher, witnesses reported heavy explosions and strikes to the city’s south.

Independent United Nations experts earlier this month appealed for deployment of an “impartial force” to be urgently deployed in Sudan for civilian protection.

Sudan’s foreign ministry, loyal to the army, rejected the idea.
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MORONI, COMOROS — Comoros President Azali Assoumani is “out of danger” after he was injured on Friday in a knife attack by a 24-year-old police officer who was found dead in his cell a day later, officials said Saturday.

The attack occurred around 2 p.m. Friday in Salimani Itsandra, a town just north of the capital, Moroni.

“The president is doing well. He has no health problems; he is out of danger. A few stitches were given,” Energy Minister Aboubacar Said Anli said at a press conference in Moroni on Saturday.

Azali was attacked as he attended a funeral, according to the presidency. The motive for the attack has not yet been determined.

The attacker, Ahmed Abdou, went on leave Wednesday before orchestrating the attack on Friday.

Abdou was placed in a cell after he was taken into custody. However, “this Saturday morning, when investigators went to see him, they found him lying on the ground, his body was lifeless,” Ali Mohamed Djounaid, Comoros’ public prosecutor, said at a separate press conference.

He added that an investigation was being conducted to determine the motive of the attack and the cause of his death.

In May, Assoumani was sworn in for a fourth term in office following a tense January election, which his opponents claim was tainted by voter fraud. Officials deny the allegations.
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JUBA, South Sudan — The government in South Sudan has postponed elections scheduled for December for two years citing the need to complete processes such as a census, the drafting of a permanent constitution and the registration of political parties.

The Presidential Adviser on National Security Tut Gatluak on Friday said the extension would provide an opportunity to complete critical processes before the new election date of December 22, 2026.

This is the second time the country, which gained independence in 2011, is postponing elections and extending a transitional period that started in February 2020.

President Salva Kiir and his former rival turned deputy, Riek Machar, signed a peace agreement in 2018 that ended a five-year civil war in which more than 400,000 people died.

Cabinet Affairs Minister Martin Elia Lomuro said the extension followed recommendations from both electoral institutions and the security sector.

Last month, the chairperson of National Election Commission, Professor Abednego Akok, told The Associated Press the country was behind the electoral calendar, which required voter registration to have started in June but was still pending due to a shortage of funds.

The country is going through an economic crisis that has seen civil servants go unpaid for almost one year, after it’s oil exports were affected by a damaged pipeline in war-torn neighboring Sudan through which it exports.

The Tumaini initiative peace talks that have been going on in neighboring Kenya, believed to provide a foundation for the inclusion of non-signatory groups to sustain peace, have also stalled.

A new security act that allows for warrantless detentions became law in August despite concerns from human rights groups that it would create fear in the runup to the elections.

Andrea Mach Mabior, an independent political analyst, warned that any sham elections may result in a waste of resources and chaos.

“Going for elections that do not meet international standards will be a waste of money,” Mabior told the AP.

But others like Edmund Yakani, executive director of the Community Empowerment Progress Organization, said delays to the elections or any extension of the transitional period would create a possibility of violence erupting across the fragile country.

“If we fail to conduct the elections in December 2024 the chance of the country turning into violence is higher than if we go for the elections,” Yakani told the AP in August.

The country, which has gone through the shocks of civil war and climate change is in need of humanitarian aid with an estimated 9 million people — 73% of the country’s population — projected to be in need of humanitarian assistance during 2024, according to the 2024 UN Humanitarian Needs Overview for South Sudan.
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Johannesburg — While the U.S. was forced to downsize and pull its troops out of Niger this year, China is increasing its military cooperation on the continent, recently announcing a plan to spend $140 million to train 6,000 military personnel — a move, a U.S. defense official said Friday, was for China’s “own economic growth and benefit.”

Among the many ways that the U.S. and China are competing for influence in Africa, analysts say military cooperation on the continent is one that is seeing rising rivalry between the two superpowers.

At a summit that focused on China-Africa cooperation last week, Chinese President Xi Jinping made the pledge to train the 6,000 military personnel. He also invited 500 African officers to visit China.

‘Most explicit’ pledge

China has been cooperating with Africa in several areas of security for years, including participating in U.N. peacekeeping missions, holding joint military drills, and providing training and education for officers. However, analysts said the latest announcement was particularly noteworthy.

“This year’s military pledge was by far the most explicit,” Lauren Johnston, associate professor of China studies at the University of Sydney, told VOA. “Never seen anything so measured and direct.”

Asked by VOA about whether Xi’s pledge means China is outperforming the U.S. when it comes to security cooperation on the continent, a spokesperson for U.S.-Africa Command, or AFRICOM, said: “We recognize that the PRC is adept at creating opportunities to expand influence on the continent.”

The PRC is the acronym for China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.

“Its long-term vision for Africa is tied to its own economic benefit and growth,” said the spokesperson, Kelly Cahalan. “The PRC is the second-largest arms supplier in Africa after Russia, with defense exports of small arms, missile systems, aerial munitions, naval vessels, combat aircraft, infantry vehicles and unmanned aerial vehicles.”

However, the AFRICOM spokesperson added that the U.S. “would welcome the PRC’s cooperation on issues such as climate change, global health security, arms control and non-proliferation.”

Niger exodus

In a blow to Washington earlier this year, the U.S. military was forced to pull troops out of Niger, after the junta there demanded the U.S. close its $100 million airbase combatting extremist groups in the Sahel region.

Since then, the U.S. has been in talks with other West African nations, including Ivory Coast, Ghana and Benin “as we start to reset and recalibrate some of our assets,” General Michael Langley commander of U.S.-Africa Command, or AFRICOM, told journalists in an online press briefing Thursday.

Langley was speaking from Kenya, after also visiting Somalia to speak with the government about counter-terrorism efforts against al-Shabab. He has spent a lot of time on the continent recently, having also visited a number of North African countries earlier this year.

Asked in the press briefing about China’s influence in Africa, General Langley said the choice lay with African governments.

“When we have engaged with our African partners, we don’t give them an ultimatum of who to choose for a security partner,” he said. “All our activities and our partnership-centric type approach should be African-led and U.S.-enabled.”

Darren Olivier, director of the conflict research consulting firm African Defense Review, said the U.S. is trying to shore up support after the blow it received in West Africa.

“The U.S. was clearly shaken by the junta takeovers in Sahelian countries like Burkina Faso & Niger and their subsequent ending of security cooperation and basing agreements,” he said in a written response to VOA, noting that the U.S. had been criticized for not being consultative enough with its African partners.

“General Langley’s tour therefore appears to be not just about shoring up support for new cooperation agreements and basing locations, but to reinforce the U.S.’s new message of listening first and advising second,” Olivier added.

Playing the long game

Efforts by the U.S. in Africa come as China is working to grow its ties as well.

Jana de Kluiver, an analyst with the Institute for Security Studies based in South Africa, said China was looking to foster long-term connections with the people who will go on to become Africa’s military top brass and political elite.

“The 6,000 military personnel trained by China will later on become higher ranking figures in their respective countries, enhancing Beijing’s soft power across the continent,” she told VOA.

In 2022, China launched what it called the Global Security Initiative, or GSI, as a counterpoint to the U.S.-led security order. One of the main tenets of the initiative is China’s principle of non-interference.

“As Chinese economic interests expand across the continent, the need for a stable security environment becomes critical. However, Beijing is careful to avoid appearing too assertive, as its broader narrative seeks to contrast with the perceived interventionism of the West,” said the Institute for Security Studies’ de Kluiver.

African Defense Review’s Olivier said it will be interesting to see how African nations that are used to Western military support and training now juggle their options.

If they opt for Chinese training, they could then choose to “silo their armed forces into units trained by Western countries and units trained by China, which will have its own impacts from incompatible doctrines and standards,” he told VOA.

China always positions itself as a no-strings attached ally of Africa and Olivier said it would also depend where China placed any pre-conditions on military cooperation.

“Western countries are traditionally skittish about training units that might commit human rights violations,” he said. “This might provide the opportunity for some countries frustrated with those restrictions to turn to Beijing for training instead.”

Base concerns

Washington has also long been concerned about the possibility that China is looking to establish a second permanent base in Africa. Beijing already has one on the continent’s east coast, in Djibouti, and is said to be seeking a foothold in West Africa.

That would give Beijing a military presence across the Atlantic from America’s East Coast, a move that analysts say would be perceived by the U.S. as a threat to national security.

China was believed to be looking to Equatorial Guinea, but those talks have reportedly stalled.

Last week Bloomberg reported the U.S. is assembling a $5 million security package, including special forces training, for Gabon. The report quoted unnamed sources, but said the deal was aimed at preventing China from establishing a base in the country.

 
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Harare, Zimbabwe — Zimbabwe’s government said Thursday it is considering a proposal to cull its elephant population to address food shortages and reduce the effects of an El Nino-induced drought.

“Zimbabwe has more elephants than our forests can accommodate,” said Sithembiso Nyoni, Zimbabwe’s minister of environment, climate, and wildlife. “We are having a discussion with ZimParks [Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority] and some communities to do like what Namibia has done, so that we can cull the elephants and mobilize the women to maybe dry the meat, package it, and ensure that it gets to some communities that need the protein.”

Zimbabwe is one the five countries in southern Africa that the World Food Programme said has been hit hard by El Nino drought, leaving millions of people food-insecure. The proposal to cull elephants in Zimbabwe follows Namibia’s recently announced plans to cull 723 wild animals — including 83 elephants — to mitigate the effects of the drought and distribute the meat to communities facing food shortages.

Much as Namibia’s decision attracted condemnation from conservationists, Zimbabwe’s proposal to cull elephants will paint the country in a bad light, said Farai Maguwu of the Center for Natural Resource Governance.

“Elephants are protected by international conventions, such as CITES [the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species]. They are in a world heritage,” said Maguwu. “So, one does not just decide to say, ‘I want to slaughter them.’ They are not like goats, which a person can just say, ‘I want to slaughter a goat and feed my family.’ There are rules and procedures.”

Maguwu said officials in Harare have long fought to change those rules.

“Zimbabwe has always been pushing for the right to kill elephants,” said Maguwu. “We all know when you look at how our natural resources are being plundered right now, like minerals, the whole idea is to sell ivory. It’s not even about the communities there.”

Maguwu also said that “there is a lot that government can do to cushion the people from the impacts of drought rather than killing elephants. I think they should stop that move.”

Zimbabwe said it has about 100,000 elephants against its carrying capacity of about 45,000 and has not been able to sell some of the jumbos because of CITES.

Minister Nyoni said Zimbabwe’s culling would fall within the confines of the country’s law.

“If Zimbabwe had a way, we would sell our elephants for ivory yesterday,” said Nyoni. “The people who prevent us from selling our ivory are people who have already finished and killed off their own animals. They don’t have elephants. And they don’t have the experience of this human wildlife conflict that we are facing. And those are people who influence the decision of CITES. So, it is a problem that Zimbabwe is facing. … There is a thinking that we move out of CITES and then do our own thing. There are consequences for doing that. Zimbabwe would like to be independent; we would like to take charge of our own animals. But we can’t because we are part of the global village.”

Nyoni added that Zimbabwe would continue to negotiate with other CITES members so that Harare is allowed to trade in ivory and elephants by CITES.

Efforts to reach CITES for comment did not yield results Thursday.
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Gaborone, Botswana — Botswana and an American biotech firm, Ginkgo Bioworks, have partnered to conduct pathogen surveillance at the country’s entry points. Health officials say the proactive move is meant to safeguard public health as the world faces emerging disease threats.

Botswana introduced mpox screening last month for travelers at its entry points.

In a statement Wednesday, Ministry of Health spokesperson Christopher Nyanga said a pathogen-monitoring program is critical to detecting similar emerging health threats.

Dr. Mbatshi Mazwiduma, a public health expert, said the pathogen-surveillance program will complement existing strategies to prevent disease threats.

“The initiative by the Ministry of Health is a very welcome development in the sense that it is at least demonstrating that they are both embracing traditional methods of surveillance and disease detection plus at the same time, they are looking at other innovative ways of disease detection,” he said.

Through the collaboration, Boston-based Gingko Bioworks will work with the Ministry of Health to collect and monitor travelers’ samples. Nasal swabs will be used to collect the samples.

Nyanga said testing will be done on a voluntary, anonymous basis.

“Although participation in this initiative is entirely voluntary, travelers are encouraged to participate because this early detection of pathogens is meant to safeguard the health of all citizens, visitors and residents of this country,” he said. “The samples collected will be kept anonymous. The data collected from the samples will be vital in strengthening the country’s robust health system and response to public health threats and emergencies.”

But Mazwiduma said voluntary participation in the pathogen-monitoring program could hinder effective disease detection.

“Perhaps if non-invasive, non-intrusive, the technique should be compulsory because it ensures that the number of people who comply to sample acquisition is increased and, therefore, you can actually rapidly achieve suitable sample sizes for you to be able to ensure that you do not miss any patients, but also more importantly that it allows you to improve your validation of these particular technologies,” Mazwiduma said.

Botswana and Gingko Bioworks previously collaborated in a 2022 pathogen-monitoring program to detect new and emerging COVID-19 variants.

During the same year, Botswana was credited with the discovery of COVID-19 variant omicron.
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United Nations — The U.N. Security Council unanimously renewed for another year an arms embargo on parties in the Darfur region of Sudan, where the war between rival generals has intensified in recent months, exacerbating a dire humanitarian crisis.

Sudan’s envoy welcomed the extension but urged the council to go further and sanction the entire Rapid Support Forces militia, the rival of the government-backed Sudanese Armed Forces.

“The militia, in its entirety, really needs to be listed, because it fulfills all the conditions,” Ambassador Al-Harith Idriss Al-Harith Mohamed said. “There also needs to be an end to the financing of the militia.”

The RSF as it is known, has captured most of Darfur, and a battle has been going on since May over North Darfur’s capital, El Fasher, which is the only Darfuri regional capital not to have fallen to the RSF.

Sudan’s military has repeatedly accused the United Arab Emirates of supplying the RSF with arms and ammunition smuggled in through neighboring Chad. The UAE strongly denies the accusations.

A report by a United Nations panel of experts earlier this year said there was substance to media reports that cargo planes originating in the UAE capital had landed in eastern Chad with arms, ammunition and medical equipment destined for the paramilitary group.

At the meeting, Sudan’s envoy accused the UAE of profiting from his nation’s natural resources, including gold and uranium, and he urged the Security Council to act.

“We are calling for clear measures to be taken against those who seek to sabotage the Sudanese economy — namely businesses and companies whose headquarters are in the UAE,” Mohamed said.

“The repetition of baseless allegations does not make them true,” Emirati Ambassador Mohamed Abushahab told the council. He urged the army, known as the SAF, to show “political courage” and participate in peace talks to end the war.

The SAF sat out U.S.- and Saudi-brokered talks in Geneva in August because the UAE was invited to participate.

The United States led the negotiations in the council on the renewal of the Darfur arms embargo, which was first put in place in 2004 during the genocide carried out by Arab Janjaweed fighters against non-Arab ethnic groups in Darfur. Janjaweed fighters make up elements of today’s RSF.

“Renewing the sanctions measures will restrict the movement of arms into Darfur and sanction individuals and entities contributing to, or complicit in, destabilizing activities of Sudan,” U.S. envoy Robert Wood said. “All of this is critical to helping end the escalating conflict, alleviate humanitarian catastrophe and put Sudan back on the path to stability and security.”

The U.S. also has proposed that the Security Council sanction two RSF commanders, but their designation remains in limbo after Russia put a hold on it on August 31.

Rights groups said the embargo renewal did not go far enough and should include the whole of Sudan.

“The council should correct this failure as soon as possible and expand the arms restrictions to cover all of Sudan, to limit the flow of arms and curb widespread atrocities being committed in the country,” said Human Rights Watch’s Jean-Baptiste Gallopin.

Sudan is facing a massive humanitarian crisis as a result of the war between the rival generals that began in April 2023. More than 10 million people have fled their homes in search of safety, and last month, international monitors confirmed famine in North Darfur. Across the country, the United Nations says, 26 million people are in crisis levels of hunger.

Human rights violations are also rife. In June, the RSF and SAF were added to an annual U.N. blacklist for perpetrators of grave violations against children. They were named for violations committed last year, including the killing and maiming of children, for attacking schools and hospitals, and in the case of the RSF, for sexual violence and recruiting and using children in their ranks.
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