Sudan drone strikes kill 21 in Nyala, hit power

A drone strike on a market in Nyala killed 21 people and wounded more than 40, while other drone attacks disrupted power supplies in parts of Sudan, medics, witnesses and an electricity company source said Tuesday.

A Nyala resident said a market in the city's north was hit on Monday at about 8:00 pm. A medic at Nyala Hospital said 21 people were killed and more than 40 injured, but said he could not identify how many were Rapid Support Forces fighters.

Nyala is the de facto capital of the RSF in Darfur. Sudan's military, which has been at war with the RSF since April 2023, regularly strikes the city.

A source at the national electricity company told AFP that RSF drones targeted the Al-Markhiyat transformer station on Tuesday, disrupting power across large parts of Khartoum and Al-Jazira states. The source spoke on condition of anonymity.

The strike came a day after what was described as a coordinated RSF drone attack on six power stations that left millions without power in Al-Jazira, White Nile, Sennar and Gedaref states.

The war is increasingly being fought with drones. In the first three weeks of October, drone strikes killed more than 300 people and injured hundreds more, according to a UN tally.

Aid workers estimate the war has killed more than 200,000 people and caused the world's largest hunger and displacement crises. On Monday, 30 countries including the United States, France and the United Kingdom warned that urgent action was needed to prevent famine expanding across Sudan.

Sudan's foreign ministry said Monday that the country's food security was “reassuring” and accused unnamed countries and organisations of politically exploiting the humanitarian situation.