Warlords, sheikhs and politicians: The men at the heart of Sudan's bloodshed Submitted by Daniel Tester on Mon, 12/22/2025 - 15:48 The conflict, now well into its third year, has seen the RSF, SAF and their allies battle each other across one of Africa's largest countries Sudanese army soldiers sit atop a tank after capturing a base used by RSF forces in Omdurman on 26 May 2025 (AFP) On Thousands have been killed and nearly 13 million displaced since Sudan’s civil war broke out in April 2023. On one side, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has been accused of war crimes and human rights abuses, including mass killings in el-Fasher in November. The RSF is fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), the country’s military, which has also been accused of atrocities. In 2019, the two worked together to oust Omar al-Bashir, Sudan 's ruler for 30 years, before splitting in 2023. Each is aligned with smaller armed groups, some of which have localised control. Regional powers are also involved: the UAE , chief supplier of arms to the RSF, has been accused of complicity in war crimes and genocide by the Sudanese government and human rights monitors , despite denying involvement. The SAF and RSF are led respectively by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo. Who is Abdel Fattah al-Burhan? Abdel Fattah al-Burhan is the head of the Sudanese army and Sudan’s internationally recognised government, led by the Transitional Sovereignty Council (TSC). Soon after Omar al-Bashir was forced from office amid a popular uprising, Burhan became the leader of a military-civilian partnership. Despite being a longtime ally of Bashir, he has said he told Sudan’s longtime ruler to step down. As leader of Sudan, Burhan strengthened ties with Egypt , described Saudi Arabia as an “eternal ally” and continued Bashir's policy of sending troops as part of the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen . Sudan's army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan attends a civil service conference in Port Sudan on 29 April 2025 (AFP) Burhan also signed the Abraham Accords agreement, set up by Washington to “ normalise ” relations with Israel in January 2021, although ratification has long been stalled amid Sudan’s domestic crises. In October 2021, alongside Hemedti, Burhan ousted civilian leaders from the TSC in a military coup , declared a state of emergency, and cracked down on protests. But Burhan and Hemedti split in April 2023 amid proposals to incorporate the RSF into Sudan’s army, triggering the current civil war. It is unclear who fired the first shot. Burhan spent the first months of the conflict besieged in his Khartoum residence, taking up arms himself before escaping while much of the city was seized by the RSF in the summer of 2023. During the war, the SAF has been accused of atrocities, including killing civilians based on their ethnicity . Relations have been fractious with the US, which has sanctioned Burhan and accused the SAF of using chemical weapons. Since then, Burhan has rejected US-backed truce proposals, describing the ceasefire plan delivered by US envoy Massad Boulous in November as the " worst yet ". Who do al-Burhan and the SAF have as allies? Kamil Idris was appointed Sudan’s prime minister by the Burhan-led TSC in May 2025. Kamil Idris addresses people and fighters supporting the Sudanese army in Omdurman on 19 July 2025 (AFP) A former UN official, Idris dissolved Sudan’s caretaker government in June, replacing it with a technocratic “ government of hope ”. He remains unelected and has been criticised by some as being a civilian proxy for Burhan’s military government. Idris has criticised the RSF at international summits, urging the UN General Assembly in September to designate the paramilitary group as a “terrorist militia”. Minni Minawi, governor of Darfur, in Port Sudan on 17 February 2025 (AFP) Minni Minnawi , the governor of Darfur, is another vocal critic of the RSF who has emerged as a key SAF ally. Minnawi, from the Zaghawa tribe, is the former leader of a faction within the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) insurgency that fought the Bashir government-backed Janjaweed militias in Darfur during the early 2000s. During Sudan’s current civil war, he has led the Joint Forces of Armed Struggle Movements (JFASM), a governmental umbrella group for former Darfur rebels that initially remained neutral before splitting in November 2023. Minnawi’s battalions took up arms against the RSF during the siege on el-Fasher. Who are Hemedti and the RSF? Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo , more commonly known by his nickname “Hemedti” (which means “Little Muhammad” in Arabic), is the leader of the RSF paramilitary group that has seized much of Sudan during the war. A member of the Arab Rizeigat tribe from Sudan’s Darfur region, Hemedti came to prominence as a leader within the government-backed Janjaweed militias during the early 2000s. The mostly Arab militias were mobilised by Bashir to quell uprisings by predominently non-Arab Darfuri rebel groups protesting against deprivation and marginalisation. The Janjaweed were accused of committing genocide and war crimes including murder, torture and rape during a conflict in which an estimated 2.5m people were displaced and 300,000 killed. Sudan's paramilitary RSF commander, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti, in Khartoum on 8 June 2022 (AFP) Bashir regularised the militias into the RSF in 2013, installing Hemedti as its commander. Further attacks were committed against civilians in Darfur in 2014 and 2015. During this period, Hemedti became one of the wealthiest businessmen in Sudan as owner of the al-Junaid Holding Company, primarily trading in gold mined in Darfur and developing financial ties with the UAE. In 2023, his worth was estimated at $7bn . After helping depose Bashir in 2019, Hemedti ruled alongside Burhan, first in a military-civilian partnership from 2019 and then in a military government from 2021 until 2023. Although officially Burhan’s deputy, Hemedti was openly ambitious, appearing in public as frequently as him, and often meeting foreign governments and rebel groups independently. Hemedti has claimed he wants to restore democracy and purge the remnants of the Bashir government within Sudan’s transitional administration, gaining him support among some Sudanese. During the civil war, his RSF has been accused of widespread atrocities, including torture, rape and summary executions, leading to sanctions and accusations of genocide from the US government, among others. Who else is involved in the RSF? Abdul Rahim Hamdan Dagalo , Hemedti’s younger brother, has been the RSF’s second in command since 2018. He keeps a high profile and frequently deputises for Hemedti on international tours. Abdul Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, the RSF deputy commander and brother of Hemedti, in Nairobi, Kenya, on 18 February 2025 (AFP) In January 2024, the United Nations Panel of Experts on Sudan identified him as having “played a pivotal role in the RSF campaign in Darfur, personally supervising the military operations in the five states [of Darfur] since October [2023]”. This includes the city of el-Fasher, which was besieged by the RSF between April 2023 and October 2025. Dagalo was present during the RSF’s attacks on the city’s population following its capture in November, during which tens of thousands are feared to have been killed, raped or tortured. Hemedti’s youngest brother, Algoney Dagalo , who is in charge of procurement for the RSF according to the US government, is a businessman based in Dubai, UAE. Do Hemedti and the RSF have any regional backers? Although it has long denied it, there is overwhelming evidence that the RSF has been supported militarily by the UAE in breach of UN arms embargoes . This includes the Gulf state sending the RSF advanced Chinese-made weaponry, according to an Amnesty International report in May 2025 and reports from US intelligence agencies in October 2025, as well as Middle East Eye’s earlier reporting . UAE foreign policy is determined by Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan [pictured above right], the UAE’s president and monarch of Abu Dhabi, alongside his younger brother, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan [above left], who serves as national security adviser and acts as its most prominent diplomat . Together, they have steered the Gulf state towards an increasingly assertive foreign policy since taking over after their eldest brother, former president Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who suffered a stroke in 2014 and died in 2022. Strategically positioned on the Red Sea, Sudan offers the UAE a key arena to project its power across the region, across which it has developed a network of military bases and has sought to expand its seaport empire . The UAE has had strong ties with Hemedti’s family since the Bashir era, having invested millions in Sudan, notably in gold mining and agriculture . The Sudanese army’s longstanding ties to political Islam have also alarmed the UAE. The Sudanese government formally accused the UAE of complicity in genocide at the International Court of Justice in April 2025, before the case was thrown out on a technicality the following month. Who else is involved in the Sudan war? Abdelaziz al-Hilu is the leader of a faction of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army-North (SPLM-N), which emerged from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) after the independence of South Sudan. The SPLM fought the Bashir government for decades, including fighting the Janjaweed in the early 2000s. Abdelaziz al-Hilu, chairperson of the SPLA-North, pictured here on the left in Nairobi on 18 February 2025 (AFP) Although it made peace with the Bashir government in 2005 and gained national independence for South Sudan in 2011, several units, some led by Hilu, remained north of the border in the Nuba Mountains region. These units have rejected peace agreements after the fall of Bashir to continue their insurgency, now controlling significant parts of South Kordofan state, gaining further territory since the outbreak of the civil war in 2023. The group remained neutral throughout much of the current war before reaching an alliance with the RSF after it declared a parallel government in February 2025. Hilu now serves as vice chairman of the parallel government’s presidential council - the president being Hemedti. Perhaps Sudan’s most prominent civilian leader is Abdalla Hamdok , who served as Sudanese prime minister following the fall of Bashir in 2019. A former UN economist, Hamdok was appointed as a transitional figure, but faced an assassination attempt in 2020 before being placed under house arrest amid a military coup led by Burhan and Hemedti in October 2021. Hamdok was briefly reinstated in November 2021 after he struck a deal with Burhan to release those detained in the coup, a move that was widely rejected as a “ betrayal ” by pro-democracy groups in Sudan. Sudanese protesters back the reinstatement of Abdalla Hamdok, the prime minister ousted during a coup, in Khartoum in July 2022 (AFP) He ultimately resigned in January 2022 amid a military crackdown on mass protests in Khartoum, in which dozens were killed by the Sudanese military. In October 2023, amid Sudan’s civil war, he founded Taqadum (“Progress”), a coalition that presented itself as civilian and civil society led. The coalition was criticised as being too close to the RSF, and eventually split and dissolved in February 2025 when some members took roles in the RSF’s parallel government. Hamdok has attempted to present himself as neutral, but has been accused of being close to RSF backer the UAE, where he lives. An appearance in London in 2024 prompted hundreds of Sudanese to take to the British capital's streets in protest . After the Taqadum split, Hamdok heads a faction called Somoud . Alaaeldin Nugud is the spokesperson for the political wing of the RSF, Tasis, also known as the Sudan Founding Alliance, that split from the broader Taqadum coalition in October 2023. He has repeatedly denied that the RSF has massacred civilians. And what about Omar al-Bashir? After he was deposed in 2019, Sudan’s longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir was sentenced to two years' imprisonment for corruption. He has remained in custody since then amid other ongoing cases against him. Sudan's former president Omar al-Bashir during his trial in Khartoum on 15 December 2020 (AFP) At the start of Sudan’s civil war in April 2023, hundreds of inmates escaped Kober Prison, where Bashir was being held. Bashir, however, was swiftly transferred to the Alaa military hospital in Omdurman. This hospital was besieged by the RSF in July 2023, throughout which Bashir remained in custody. Bashir, 82, also faces charges at the International Criminal Court, including of genocide and war crimes, for his role in the Darfur genocide in the early 2000s. He has so far not been transferred to ICC custody in the Hague amid Sudan’s ongoing turmoil, although the court has found other figures within his administration guilty over their roles in Darfur. Sudan war Explainers Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:29 Update Date Override 0