For almost two years, Emad Mouawad had been repeatedly shuttled from one Sudanese paramilitary-run detention centre to another, terrified each day would be his last.

The 44-year-old Egyptian merchant spent years selling home appliances in neighbouring Sudan before fighters from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) stormed his Khartoum home in June 2023, taking him and six others into custody.

"They accused us of being Egyptian spies," he told AFP, back home in Kafr Abu Shanab, a quiet village in Egypt's Fayoum governorate southwest of Cairo.

The RSF has accused Egypt of involvement in the war, which Cairo has denied.

"We were just traders, but to them, every Egyptian was a suspect," said Mouawad, recalling how his captors searched their phones and home.

They found nothing, but that did not spare the group, who were blindfolded, crammed into a truck and driven to one of the RSF's many detention sites in Khartoum.

It was two months into the RSF's war with the army, and hundreds of thousands of people had already fled to the Egyptian border, seeking safety.

"We couldn't just go and leave our things to be looted," said Mouawad.

"We had debts to........

© International Business Times