This week,  the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in Sudan achieved a major strategic victory against the Sudanese Armed Forces. After days of fighting, the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, gained control over Sudan's second-largest city Wad Medani, around 180 kilometers (110 miles) south of the capital, Khartoum.

The two military groups have been fighting since April. The Sudanese Armed Forces has about 200,000 personnel and is headed by General Abdel-Fattah Burhan; it works more like a regular army. Meanwhile the RSF is estimated to have 70,000 to 100,000 personnel and is headed by Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti.

The RSF works more like a guerrilla force, and now seems to have the upper hand. "Capturing Wad Medani is definitely an indication for a turning point in favor of the Rapid Support Forces," Hamid Khalafallah, a Sudanese policy analyst, told DW. 

After this week, the armed forces effectively only have control over the east and north of the country. Darfur and the south are under RSF control, or remain a combat zone. There have been reports that both sides are committing war crimes. Residents of RSF-controlled areas have reported mass rapes, looting, killings and detentions, something the RSF has denied.

Observers in Wad Medani have reported that some 300,000 people have fled the city. Most are heading south toward the city of Sennar, around 100 kilometres (62 miles) away. But eyewitnesses have said RSF fighters don't allow everyone to leave.

"RSF fighters loot private cars and belongings so that civilians, including women with babies, are in a state of panic and leave by foot," said Khalafallah. His father is one of the many civilians fleeing Wad Medani.

 

Civilian activists forced to flee

Since the outbreak of the fighting in April, more than half a million Sudanese civilians have taken refuge in Jazeera province and Wad Medani, its capital. It was widely considered safe because the Armed Forces were in charge there, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Many international aid organizations had been coordinating humanitarian support from the city, but suspended efforts this week after the RSF takeover.

Michelle D'Arcy, Sudan country director for the Norwegian People's Aid organization, doesn't believe that Sennar, or any other city, can offer safety for civilians. "There are no safe zones really," she told DW. "People are moving but they're also moving to zones that could be affected by conflict very soon."

Things are not looking good, but somehow Sudanese civil society activists have not given up. They played a major role during the democratic transition period after the country's popular uprising ousted long-term dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

Following Bashir's ouster — a combined effort from civilian pro-democracy protesters and the Sudanese military — the army agreed to share power with civilians until real elections could be held.

But the transition toward democracy ended in late 2021 when the Sudanese military took control in a coup. Since then, the two military forces have been jousting for power. When that power struggle turned into ongoing violence earlier this year, Sudanese civil society was effectively excluded from national politics.

Around 5.5 million people have since been displaced inside Sudan, and at least another 1.3 million people have sought refuge in neighboring countries, including in Egypt, Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic, South Sudan and Ethiopia, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency.

Life is difficult for activists who left

That includes many of the original pro-democracy activists.

"Life in the host country is difficult," Rania Abdelaziz, a Sudanese activist who fled to Egypt this summer, told DW. "Those who came with savings have spent it by now. Those who came with jobs have lost them [due to the collapse of the economy in Sudan], and employment [in Egypt] is not allowed, so even applying for a job is not an option," she said. 

Any hope Abdelaziz has for the future of her country is in Sudanese civil society in Sudan and abroad, she said.

"The neighborhood committees have turned into emergency response teams in war-affected areas," she said. "Others contribute to the political narrative in the hope of a solution to the war." She is referring to the so-called "neighborhood resistance committees" that were formed by civilians in Sudanese neighboods during pro-democracy protests. 

Activists are also continuing to work away from home. 

"We founded the Sudanese Youth Network in Uganda's capital Kampala in October," Abdel Basit, a lawyer and activist, told DW. Since then, around 200 young Sudanese activists have joined from Chad, Nairobi, Ethiopia and Sudan. On Facebook, they come together to discuss topics like how to end the war, make peace and establish a democratic government under civilian rule.

"Most Sudanese are young and well connected," Basit told DW. "All of them are frustrated about what is happening now and they believe that their only chance is to come up with an idea of how to build our new Sudan."

When will fighting end?

There isn't much hope that violence will subside soon. The two forces are evenly matched, and experts fear the Sudanese conflict is devolving into a proxy war. Saudi Arabia and Egypt back the Sudan Armed Forces, while the United Arab Emirates supports the RSF.

"A proxy war is being fought in Sudan, a fact that has received little attention to date," Roman Deckert, a Sudan researcher at the Berlin-based organization Media in Cooperation and Transition, told German news agency EPD. As long as these countries continue to support the opposing Sudanese generals, he said it's unlikely fighting will end.

So far, at least 12,000 people have died in the war, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, which collects real-time data on political violence and protest activity around the world.

Edited by: Cathrin Schaer