File photo: This handout satellite image by Vantor taken on October 26, 2025 and made available on October 31, 2025 shows smoke billowing from fires burning around El-Fasher Airport in El-Fasher. (Photo by Handout / Satellite image Vantor / AFP)
New York: The United Nations stated that UN staff who entered El Fasher, western Sudan, last Friday for the first time since the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) took control last October, found the city almost deserted.
Denise Brown, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, explained in a statement Monday that it was impossible to determine the exact number of people remaining in El Fasher. She noted that the people UN staff saw were living inside abandoned buildings or in makeshift camps made of simple plastic sheeting.
She noted that negotiations regarding the UN's demands for safe passage and freedom of movement had lasted several weeks, while the visit itself only lasted a few hours. She added, "The city wasn't teeming with people. There were very few people we were able to see."
Brown explained that the visit aimed to assess whether El Fasher could be safely accessed while the UN explored ways to deliver essential supplies to the city. She added, "But frankly, we remain deeply concerned about the wounded, whom we haven't been able to see, and who may be in detention."
She said that during the visit, medical staff were observed at the Saudi hospital in the city, but they had no supplies. She also pointed out that the World Health Organization had previously reported that the hospital was the site of a massacre in which 460 people were killed.
Survivors had previously reported mass killings motivated by ethnicity and widespread arrests during and after the city's capture. The fate of many people in El Fasher and the surrounding areas remains unknown.
It is worth noting that more than 100,000 people have fled El Fasher since late October, after the RSF seized control following an 18-month siege.
