PORT SUDAN — The United Nations demanded an investigation Friday into the “horrendous accounts” of atrocities emerging from Sudan’s El-Fasher as the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces claimed they had arrested several fighters accused of abuses during the capture of the city.

At war with the army since April 2023, the RSF seized El-Fasher on Sunday, dislodging the army’s last stronghold in the western Darfur region after an 18-month siege marked by bombardment and starvation.

Survivors who reached the nearby town of Tawila told AFP of mass killings, children shot before their parents, and civilians beaten and robbed as they fled.

The RSF said late Thursday it had detained several men accused of “violations… during the liberation” of El-Fasher, including one known as Abu Lulu, who appeared in multiple TikTok videos committing summary executions.

In one clip verified by AFP, he is seen shooting unarmed men at close range. Another shows him standing among fighters celebrating near dozens of bodies and burnt vehicles.

The RSF released footage appearing to show Abu Lulu behind bars in what they claimed to be a North Darfur prison.

It pledged to ensure “military discipline during wartime,” and promised a fair trial for those detained.

Since El-Fasher’s fall, videos circulating online have purportedly shown men in RSF uniforms carrying out summary executions around the city, which has been cut off from all communications.

Emtithal Mahmoud, a US-based Sudanese poet from El-Fasher, told AFP she recognized her cousin, Nadifa, in a video shared by RSF accounts, lying dead on the ground.

The UN said the death toll could reach the hundreds, while army allies have accused the RSF of killing over 2,000 civilians.

On Friday, the United Nations voiced alarm at emerging details of executions, gang rapes and abductions in El-Fasher.

“We have received horrendous accounts of summary executions, mass killings, rapes, attacks against humanitarian workers, looting, abductions and forced displacement,” said UN rights........

© The Times of Israel