In the Imtidad Nasser neighbourhood east of Khartoum, residents say the buzz of drones has become a terrifying new reality. Ahmed Abdel Hamid, a local resident, told Al Jazeera that anti-aircraft fire and two huge explosions followed a recent RSF drone attack, killing three children from one family.
Both sides have ramped up drone operations as the conflict, now in its fourth year, grinds on. Military expert Abu Bakr Abdel Rahim said the army's main motive for striking targets deep inside Darfur and Kordofan is targeting command and control centres, fuel depots and supply routes, especially those near Libya, Chad and South Sudan. He noted that the vast, exposed geography makes ground advance highly complex without aerial cover.
Mohamed Didan, spokesperson for the SAF's Special Action Forces in Kordofan, stated on Facebook that the army launched 75 air strikes across Kordofan, West Darfur and South Darfur. He linked the RSF's drone attacks on Khartoum to its battlefield losses, adding that the RSF is deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure such as Khartoum airport, fuel stations and an electrical transformer station.
The RSF issued a statement accusing the military of using drones to carry out massacres at a livestock market in Nyala, a market in Abyei and a truck station in West Kordofan. A Sudanese government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the army does not target civilians and considers military and logistical sites of the RSF legitimate targets.
The deadliest recent attack occurred near a market in al-Dabba, West Kordofan, where a drone struck a transport hub, killing 80 people. On Monday, an army drone hit the RSF stronghold of Nyala, killing 17, while a paramilitary strike on displaced people in Blue Nile province killed 41.
The United Nations condemned the strikes. Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for the UN secretary-general, said, "We are alarmed by the continued deadly drone strikes across the country that are killing civilians, including children, and that are disrupting central services."
An investigation by the Centre for Information Resilience found 21 different drone models have been used since the war erupted, sourced mainly from six countries: Belarus, Iran, China, Russia, Sudan and Turkiye. The RSF has deployed 10 types, the SAF five.