Li Fung (middle), the top UN human rights official in Sudan, meets with survivors of Sudan’s civil war during a visit to the country by Volker Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (photo credit Anthony Headley/OHCHR)
Civilian Harm as a Tactic of War
Three years into the conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces, Sudan has become the site of the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.
More than 15 million people have been driven from their homes. Nearly 34 million — roughly two-thirds of the population — now depend on humanitarian aid to survive. In many regions, families survive on one meal a day, if that. Some eat leaves or animal feed to stay alive.
But it is not only the scale of suffering that is alarming. In this war, civilian harm is not just a tragic consequence of the fighting; it is a central tactic.
“This is first and foremost a human rights and protection crisis,” said Li Fung, the United Nations’ top human rights official in the country and a 20-year veteran of the UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights.
Speaking from Khartoum as Sudan enters its fourth year of conflict, Fung, an Australian human rights lawyer, described a war defined by relentless human rights abuses against civilians, the targeting of critical infrastructure and the obstruction of life-saving aid.
“The persistent violations of international humanitarian and human rights law — and continued impunity — are what’s driving the crisis,” she stressed.
“The persistent violations of international humanitarian and human rights law — and continued impunity — are what’s driving the crisis.”
Targeting the Innocent
Across much of the country, basic infrastructure has been destroyed, damaged or rendered out of service. Two-thirds of hospitals have had to close, leaving a health system in ruin. Access to water is unreliable or nonexistent in many areas, with numerous cases of militias deliberately seizing or cutting off civilian supplies. And as combat shifts from boots on the ground to drones, these civilian spaces — and civilians themselves — are getting easier to target.
In fact, in the first three months of 2026, 82 percent of civilian deaths documented by the UN Human Rights Office were due to drone strikes, equating to 734 of the 892 cases.
“Markets are being hit during opening hours, when they are full of civilians,” she explained. “The deliberate targeting of hospitals, markets, schools and critical infrastructure is illegal under international humanitarian law.”
“The deliberate targeting of hospitals, markets, schools and critical infrastructure is illegal under international humanitarian law.”
Taken together — alongside an economic contraction exceeding 40 percent and unemployment affecting more than half the population — and the outcome is as predictable as it is devastating: desperation.
Armed groups then exploit the scarcity, recruiting fighters with promises of provisions and a license to loot. Violence and deprivation have thus become both a survival mechanism and an economic model to maintain the militias’ numbers.
Darfur, Again
Nowhere is the suffering more acute than in Darfur, which experienced similar levels of devastation beginning in 2002, in what the International Criminal Court took up as a crime of genocide.
When the Rapid Support Forces captured El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur in October 2025, Fung said “at least 6,000 people were killed within the first three days of the offensive.” The UN Human Rights Office’s own report, however, states: “The actual scale of the death toll during the period of the final offensive is undoubtedly significantly higher.”
Sexual violence has been widespread and systematic, with UNICEF documenting victims under the age of four, including one-year-old babies.
“Rape, gang rape and other forms of sexual violence are used as a weapon of war … along exit routes as civilians flee, during searches.”
“Rape, gang rape and other forms of sexual violence are used as a weapon of war.”
The assault is only the beginning. “It doesn’t stop when the rape happens,” she underscored. “There’s the trauma, there’s the stigma… and now, women and girls who are pregnant as a result of rape.”
“We’re not talking small numbers… hundreds.”
These are not isolated atrocities. They are tools routinely used to terrorize and control.
What’s more, she said, “they persist because there is little cost to committing them… impunity is rampant.”
Civil Society at the Center
Despite the scale of the crisis, Fung points to the spirit and resilience of the Sudanese people as essential to their survival. This is particularly evident as donor countries have pulled back and funding cuts have starved vital services and lifelines.
Across the country, local volunteers, networks and civil society groups have become the backbone of mutual aid. “These are people with real agency,” she noted, “working at the front lines to respond to their fellow Sudanese.”
They are also increasingly targeted and harassed.
“If we want to find solutions,” she said, “we need to create the space for Sudanese communities to be actively involved.”
“We need to create the space for Sudanese communities to be actively involved.”
A Conflict Close to Home
For policymakers, Sudan can feel remote — another crisis vying for limited resources and attention. That is a dangerous illusion.
“Sudan sits at a strategic crossroad… connected to the Sahel, East and North Africa, the Gulf,” she explained. “It’s a real tinderbox.”
To Sudan’s east lies the Red Sea, one of the world’s most vital trade corridors and home to undersea cables carrying roughly 20 percent of global internet traffic. The region is already under strain, shaped by instability tied to Iran-backed groups such as the Houthis.
A collapsing Sudan will not remain contained.
Displacement is already destabilizing neighboring countries. Armed networks are expanding across borders. External actors are deepening their involvement, supplying weapons and drones while extracting resources, including Sudan’s largely unregulated gold, which accounts for roughly 70 percent of exports, about 80 percent of the global market for gum arabic, used in everything from soft drinks to cosmetics.
What begins as a domestic conflict can quickly metastasize into a regional — even global — one. Sudan already shows the signs.
This is how humanitarian crises become security crises. And by the time they are recognized as such, they are far harder to suppress.
By the time humanitarian crises become security crises, they are far harder to suppress.
That is why Fung urges the United States to use its leverage — sanctions, diplomacy and pressure on the parties to the conflict, their supporters and on external actors fueling the war. Sudan cannot be treated as solely a humanitarian crisis to address, but as a political and security crisis to confront. That means targeting what sustains it: impunity, arms flows and the economic networks that keep it alive.
“If you’ve got the influence, use that pressure,” Fung said.
Because as Sudan marks another grim anniversary, there are indications the conflict is not slowing. It is already reshaping a region — and millions of lives with it.
“We know and see what’s going on — the atrocities, devastation and flagrant disregard for international law. The international community must act.”
“We know and see what’s going on… The international community must act.”
