Air wars claiming civilian lives

A drone attack on a busy market in western Sudan has killed 11 people and wounded dozens more, including children, as the UN warns that the country’s rapidly escalating air wars have claimed more than 200 civilian lives in little over a week. The attack on Adikong market, near Sudan’s border with Chad, ignited fuel reserves and sent flames tearing through the area, reports Al Jazeera. Doctors Without Borders said it had treated more than 20 of the wounded at a hospital it supports across the border in Adre, and that seven of the injured were children. It described it as the second deadly drone attack on the same area in less than a month. Drones have become a key weapon used by both sides in the war between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the ‌paramilitary Rapid Support Forces that began in April 2023. UN Human Rights Chief Volker Turk said he was appalled by the scale of intensifying aerial assaults on civilians in the war, warning that more than 200 people had been killed by drones across the Kordofan region and White Nile state since 4 March alone. ‘It is deeply troubling that despite multiple reminders, warnings and appeals, parties to the conflict continue to use increasingly powerful drones to deploy explosive weapons in populated areas,’ Turk said. In West Kordofan, at least 152 civilians were killed in strikes attributed to the SAF, including about 50 when a market and hospital were struck simultaneously in al-Muglad on 4 March.

Full Al Jazeera report