CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — Sudan’s paramilitary forces killed hundreds of people, including patients in a hospital, after they seized El-Fasher city in the western Darfur region over the weekend, according to the UN, displaced residents and aid workers, who described harrowing details of atrocities.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organization, said in a statement that 460 patients and companions were reportedly killed at Saudi Maternity Hospital in El-Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur. He said the WHO was “appalled and deeply shocked” by the reports.

The Sudan Doctors Network, a medical group tracking the war, said fighters from the Rapid Support Forces on Tuesday “cold-bloodedly killed everyone they found inside the Saudi Hospital, including patients, their companions, and anyone else present in the wards.”

Mini Minawi, the governor of Darfur, shared a video online, which purported to show RSF fighters inside the Saudi Maternity Hospital. The minute-long footage shows bodies lying on the floor in pools of blood. A fighter fires a single shot from a Kalashnikov-style rifle into a lone man sitting up, who then slumps to the floor. Other bodies could be seen outside. The Associated Press could not independently verify the date, location, or condition under which the video was recorded.

Sudanese residents and aid workers also described some of the atrocities carried out by the RSF, fighting since 2023 to take over Africa’s third-largest nation, after they seized the army’s last stronghold in Darfur after over 500 days of siege.

“The Janjaweed showed no mercy for anyone,” said Umm Amena, a mother of four children who fled the city on Monday after two days, using a Sudanese term for the RSF.

RSF commander Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo on Wednesday acknowledged what he called “abuses” by his forces. In his first comments since the fall of El-Fasher, posted on the Telegram messaging app, he said an investigation was opened. He did not elaborate.

The RSF has been accused by the UN and rights groups of atrocities throughout the war, including a 2023 attack on another Darfur city, Geneina, where hundreds of people were killed.

Amena was among three dozen people, mostly women and children, who were detained........

© The Times of Israel