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‘Fifty or Sixty People in a Single Street’: Witnesses Describe Civilian Killings in Sudan’s Al-Fashir
A woman from El Fasher prays surrounded by displaced women, in a camp in Al-Dabbah, Sudan, Nov. 3, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig
Civilians in al–Fashir were shot in the streets, targeted in drone strikes, and crushed by trucks, witnesses to the first days of the RSF’s takeover described to Reuters, providing a glimpse into the violent capture of one of Sudan’s largest cities.
The fall of al–Fashir on Oct. 26 has cemented the Rapid Support Forces’ control of the Darfur region in its two-and-a-half-year war with the Sudanese army. Videos of soldiers killing civilians on the outskirts of the city and reports of attacks on those escaping have raised international alarm.
But less is known about what happened inside al–Fashir, which has been cut off from telecommunications since the start of the RSF offensive. Reuters spoke to three people who fled to the city of al-Dabba, more than 1,000 km away in northern Sudan, and one person who fled to the nearby town of Tawila.
One witness said he was in a group trying to flee intense shelling when RSF trucks surrounded them, and sprayed civilians with machine-gun fire and crushed them with their vehicles.
“Young people, elderly, children, they ran them over,” said the witness, who did not want to give his name for fear of retribution, speaking by phone from Tawila. Some civilians were abducted by RSF fighters, he said.
Asked for comment, an RSF leader told Reuters investigations were underway and anyone proven to have committed abuses would be held accountable, but that reports of violations in al–Fashir had been exaggerated by the army and its allies.
‘FIFTY OR SIXTY KILLED IN A SINGLE STREET’
The killings continued on the second day of the RSF offensive, said another witness named Mubarak, now in al-Dabba. RSF fighters raided homes in residential areas having captured the army’s base the day before, he said.
“Fifty or sixty people in a single street … they kill them bang, bang, bang. Then they would go to the next street, and again bang, bang, bang. That’s the massacre I saw in front of me,” Mubarak said. Many people, often injured or elderly, didn’t leave the city and were killed in their homes, he said.
Local resistance fighters, largely armed young men, were in the streets fighting the offensive, with army soldiers and allied fighters in bases or retreating.
“They were the ones who died more,” he said.
Anyone out in the street was “targeted by the drones and a lot of bullets,” Mubarak said. Al–Fashir residents have reported drones following civilians and targeting any gatherings in recent months.
Another eyewitness, Abdallah, who spoke to Reuters in al-Dabba, said he also saw fleeing civilians targeted by drones. He said he saw 40 dead bodies on the ground in one location in al–Fashir.
Reuters could not independently verify their accounts, though they broadly correspond to reports from aid officials, the United Nations, and verified social media videos.
SATELLITE IMAGERY
Satellite imagery reported by Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab last week showed objects consistent with dead bodies in several parts of al–Fashir. Further images showed earth disturbances that suggested mass graves and the disappearance of objects and presence of large vehicles that suggested the movement of bodies, people, or looting, it said this week.
Imagery also indicated the RSF had closed off a main exit point from the city, leading to the town of Garney.
Traumatized civilians are still trapped inside al–Fashir, said UN human rights chief Volker Turk on Friday. “I fear that the abominable atrocities such as summary executions, rape, and ethnically motivated violence are continuing,” he said.
On Thursday, the RSF said it had agreed to a proposal from the United States and Arab powers for a humanitarian ceasefire and said it was open to talks on a cessation of hostilities. On Friday morning, the paramilitary force launched drone attacks on the capital Khartoum and the city of Atbara, eyewitnesses said.
Both the RSF and the Sudanese army have agreed to various ceasefire proposals during their war, which has created widening pockets of famine, including in al–Fashir. None have succeeded.
TREACHEROUS ESCAPE
Those who managed to leave al–Fashir have reported treacherous journeys with violent RSF searches, the disappearance of men, and kidnappings for ransom.
Umm Jumaa made it to al-Dabba with four of her grandchildren, but hasn’t been able to find her two sons, both army soldiers, or her daughter. Before she fled al–Fashir she witnessed RSF fighters beating civilians to death, she said.
“Those who didn’t die, they would say, ‘finish them off, finish them off, this one isn’t dead, finish him off.’”
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Ukraine, Russia Swap 193 Prisoners of War Each in US, UAE-Facilitated Exchange
Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) react after a swap, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, at an unknown location in Ukraine, April 24, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Anatolii Stepanov
Ukraine and Russia conducted a prisoner of war swap on Friday, sending back 193 captured personnel each in an exchange both sides said was facilitated by the United States and the United Arab Emirates.
“It is important that there are exchanges and that our people are returning home,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a post on Telegram.
His chief of staff, Kyrylo Budanov, and Russia‘s defence ministry said the US and the UAE had assisted with the exchange.
Russia and Ukraine have conducted many prisoner swaps over four years of war, exchanging thousands of captives in total.
Zelenskiy said some of the returned captives, who included soldiers, border guards, and police, had injuries, while others had faced criminal charges in Russia.
In Ukraine, returning captives streamed off buses, many draped in their country’s flag and overwhelmed with emotion.
“It still hasn’t sunk in that I’m home, I was in captivity for three years … our Ukrainian sky, our trees — this is happiness,” said Serhiy, a soldier, who gave only his first name.
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Main Suspect in Syria’s Tadamon Massacre Arrested, Ministry Says
Residents gather in a street after Friday prayers to celebrate the arrest of Amjad Yousef, a key suspect in the 2013 Tadamon massacre, in Tadamon, Syria, April 24, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi
Syria’s Interior Ministry said on Friday it had arrested the main suspect in the 2013 Tadamon massacre, one of the worst acts of violence attributed to the former government of Bashar al-Assad, in which 288 civilians were killed.
The ministry released footage of Amjad Yousef’s arrest in the Al-Ghab Plain area of Hama province in western Syria, near his hometown. Yousef had been hiding there since the overthrow of Assad at the end of 2024, a security source told Reuters.
US Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack welcomed the arrest in a post on X, calling it an important step towards accountability for atrocities committed during Syria’s war.
DOCUMENTING THE MASSACRE
Yousef, 40, a former member of military intelligence under Assad, was thrust into the spotlight in April 2022 when the UK’s Guardian newspaper published videos provided by two academics that they said showed him forcing blindfolded civilians to run towards a pit in the Tadamon neighborhood of southern Damascus before shooting them.
Annsar Shahoud, a researcher at the University of Amsterdam Holocaust and Genocide Center and one of the academics, spent four years documenting the massacre.
Posing as an online fangirl, Shahoud gained Yousef’s trust and ultimately obtained his confessions both on video and audio recording.
Reuters was unable to reach Yousef for comment as he has been taken into custody.
The massacre is one of the most egregious documented incidents of violence attributed to the Assad government during the 14-year bloody war that began in 2011.
After Assad’s fall at the end of 2024, civilians, media outlets and international organizations went to the site of the massacre to inspect it and interview witnesses. Locals refer to the site as “Amjad Yousef’s Pit.” It has been marked on Google Maps as “The Site of the Tadamon Massacre.”
Ahmed Adra, a Tadamon resident and a member of the neighborhood committee, said victims’ families had been celebrating in the streets since morning.
“We will take white roses and plant them at the site of the massacre and tell the victims that their memory is alive and that justice is being served,” he told Reuters.
Shahoud said she now felt safe with Yousef in custody, but added the path to justice in Syria was unclear and did not include all perpetrators.
“I feel safe now, despite the distance, because I always felt for years that this person was after me,” she told Reuters.
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Merz Floats Sanctions Relief for Iran Peace Deal, Other EU Leaders Cautious
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz speaks during a cabinet meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Feb. 4, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Liesa Johannssen
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz suggested on Friday that the European Union could ease sanctions on Tehran as part of a comprehensive deal that would end the Iran war, but other EU leaders struck a more cautious note.
The 27-nation EU has imposed sanctions on Iran for years, including travel bans and asset freezes for senior officials and entities, in response to human rights violations, nuclear activities, and military support for Russia.
US officials have suggested a comprehensive deal covering Iran‘s nuclear and missile programs and the re-opening of the Strait of Hormuz could bring a lasting end to the US-Israeli war with Tehran, beyond the current ceasefire.
After an EU summit in Cyprus, Merz said the bloc could gradually ease sanctions on Iran in the event that a comprehensive agreement was reached.
European leaders have been largely sidelined in the current Middle East conflict but some European officials see the bloc’s sanctions as a possible way for the EU to be involved in a diplomatic solution.
“The easing of sanctions can be part of a process,” Merz told reporters after the Nicosia summit.
“No one has objected to that,” he said of the summit deliberations. “It is, so to speak, part of the contribution we can make to advance this process and, hopefully, lead to a permanent ceasefire.”
But European Council President Antonio Costa, the chair of the summit, told a press conference after the end of the meeting: “It is too early to talk about relieving any kind of sanctions.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said sanctions relief could only come after clear evidence of fundamental changes of course from Iran.
“We believe that sanctions relief should be conditional on verification of de-escalation, particularly on progress on the international effort to contain its nuclear threat, and on a change to the repression of its own people,” she told the same press conference.