Civilians combed through the wreckage of their homes Sunday in the Sudanese city of El-Fasher, besieged for months by paramilitaries who have now launched a “full-scale assault”, according to the United Nations.
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As the world body’s high-level General Assembly meeting prepares on Sunday to debate Sudan’s 17-month war – which has claimed tens of thousands of lives and caused the world’s largest displacement crisis – world leaders have warned against cataclysmic violence in the city of two million.
US President Joe Biden has called on Sudan’s rival generals to “pull back their forces, facilitate unhindered humanitarian access, and re-engage in negotiations to end this war”.
But on the ground, shells have once again torn through civilian homes, in the latest flare-up of the war between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the regular army which has raged since April 2023.
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“Most of our homes in the city’s south have been completely destroyed,” said Al-Tijani Othman, a local resident spoke to by phone from his bombed-out neighbourhood.