Since the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) seized the headquarters of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) 16th Infantry Division in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur, on October 26, 2023, the state has experienced its most complex security situation since the Darfur war that erupted in 2003.
Residents now live amid widespread killings, arbitrary arrests and detentions, looting, threats, and acts of seemingly unprovoked violence, conditions that have brought much of the region’s social and economic life close to paralysis.
As security conditions have become increasingly fluid and the procedural and legal restrictions imposed by the Tasis administration have multiplied, citizens’ freedom of movement has narrowed and their presence in public space has diminished, despite ongoing efforts to adapt and endure.
On May 10, Prime Minister Mohamed Hassan Al-Ta’ishi of the Tasis government met with his Interior minister and police chief to discuss the creation of a police force capable of curbing crime and restoring public order. The meeting addressed the force’s organizational structure, specialized units, uniforms and armament, as well as training programmes, salaries, civil registration, criminal investigations, traffic policing, intelligence services, prisons, and courts.
The move followed the earlier establishment of the Federal Police for Civilian Protection, affiliated with the Tasis coalition. The force began operating in 2025, initially in South Darfur before expanding to other territories under the coalition’s control.
“Don’t you know the face veil is banned?”
If you are going to the market, the first thing you do is make sure your phone stays at home. You also avoid carrying bags or displaying large amounts of cash.
Nafisa, a resident of Nyala
Nafisa, a resident of the South-West Radio neighbourhood of Nyala, says restrictions on movement intensify whenever Sudanese military airstrikes increase.
According to her, inspections become particularly frequent after each aerial attack. RSF personnel carry out the searches, especially at the Tandabai checkpoint south of the city, where passers-by are often accused of collaborating with the SAF, distributing SIM cards, or transmitting military coordinates.
She says there are four checkpoints between the Popular Market south of Wadi Birli and the Grand Market in central Nyala, in addition to three more between the Grand Market and the Al-Jenaynah transport station. Pedestrians are routinely searched and questioned, while women wearing the niqab face especially close scrutiny.
Nafisa recalled being searched while returning from Kalma camp to Nyala last week.
“The search was deeply humiliating. They went through all my personal belongings and asked why I wore the niqab. I told them it was for religious reasons. One of them replied, ‘Don’t you know the face veil is banned?’ Then he forcibly removed my niqab and exposed my face without my consent.”
Residents, she says, have developed their own strategies for coping with the new reality.
“If you are going to the market, the first thing you do is make sure your phone stays at home. You also avoid carrying bags or displaying large amounts of cash.”
During the month of May, Nyala experienced a series of drone strikes widely believed to have been carried out by the SAF. The attacks damaged infrastructure and triggered widespread panic among residents. They were followed by tighter security measures, including restrictions on young men travelling outside South Darfur and limits on the use of Starlink internet terminals between 6am and 6pm., according to information obtained by Atar.
Mohamed Awad, a pseudonym used for the safety of a Nyala resident, says the restrictions are a mixed blessing. “The ban is helpful to some extent, even though it cuts off our source of income.”
Two weeks ago, Mohamed says, he was attacked while using a public Wi-Fi point. Men allegedly affiliated with the RSF attempted to steal his phone. When he resisted, he was stabbed before the attackers fled with both the device and his money.
“I escaped with minor injuries, but incidents like this usually end with the victim being killed. Throughout the years of war, we haven’t gone two days without a murder, kidnapping, robbery, flogging, or humiliation,” he told Atar.
He noted that Nyala’s markets were shut down three times during the week preceding last year’s Eid al-Adha holiday: once following the killing of the chief of the Turgum tribe, again after a citizen was killed in Gadra market, and a third time after a dispute involving RSF personnel.
Mohamed also recounted the kidnapping of one of his neighbours, who was abducted from his shop by armed men travelling in a Land Cruiser vehicle mounted with a DShK heavy machine gun.
The kidnappers demanded a ransom of two million Sudanese pounds. After the family collected and delivered the money, the victim’s mother was instructed to go to a tree near the Sugra Hills east of the city. There, she found her son’s body. He had reportedly been subjected to severe torture before his death.
On May 23, the RSF-affiliated Civil Administration published statements on its Facebook page by its head, Yousif Mohamed Yousif, praising an intelligence operation that secured the release of a hostage and arrested members of the gang responsible. Yousif also claimed that crime rates in South Darfur had fallen by 50 per cent during the month of May.
The economics of checkpoints
There are 36 checkpoints and road barriers along the route between Nyala and Nertiti. 33 are operated by the RSF and 3 by the SLA, roughly one checkpoint every 4 km
Yahya Al-Sayir, a driver operating the Nyala-Nertiti route
In 2025, the Federal Police of the Tasis coalition launched a campaign against what it described as negative phenomena, dismantling a number of illegal road barriers.
According to Yahya Al-Sayir, a driver operating the route between Nyala and Nertiti in Central Darfur, all of those barriers returned only weeks after the campaign ended.
The roughly 150-kilometre journey between Nyala and Nertiti now takes more than two hours despite the paved road, largely because of the sheer number of checkpoints.
Yahya said there are 36 checkpoints and road barriers along the route. Thirty-three are operated by the RSF, while three belong to the Sudan Liberation Army faction led by Abdel Wahid Mohamed al-Nur, roughly one checkpoint every four kilometres.
Each checkpoint charges passenger vehicles a fee of 2,000 Sudanese pounds, increasing transport fares between Nyala and Nertiti from 20,000 pounds to 35,000 pounds.
Identity cards, he said, have become the most important element of any inspection. Travellers arriving from Sudan’s northern and eastern states are frequently accused of links to the SAF. Their phones are then searched, particularly WhatsApp conversations and photo galleries, and judgments are often made based on the contents of the device.
Imran, who travelled from Nyala to Al-Malam to spend Eid al-Adha with his family, described a similar experience.
The road from Nyala to Mershing, approximately 65 kilometres to the north, contains 19 barriers and three checkpoints located at the city exit, the Damma area, and the entrance to Mershing.
Every vehicle pays a crossing fee of 2,000 pounds, while two major checkpoints charge freight vehicles 50,000 pounds. Additional fees are imposed on passengers under the label of “insurance fees”, collected in instalments, one payment in Mershing and another in Al-Malam.
According to Imran, the arrangement suggests a coordinated revenue-sharing system among the forces operating the checkpoints.
He recalled an encounter that particularly struck him. One RSF member boarded the vehicle and, like a bus conductor collecting fares, began demanding 5,000 pounds from each passenger, repeating, “Brother, if you don’t want to pay the insurance fee, then go ahead.”
The phrase sounded calm, even joking on the surface, Imran said. Yet beneath the casual tone lay an unmistakable threat.
East Beliel: Burned villages and abandoned fields
On December 21 2022, violent clashes erupted in areas east of Beliel locality, displacing residents from 21 villages and leaving more than 100 people dead or injured, according to figures released at the time by the Daju tribe’s traditional leadership.
Musa, who was displaced from the Joghan Damba area east of Beliel, said the roots of the conflict lie in disputes over land ownership. Many families, he explained, have been unable to return to farming since 2023 because displacement and violence continue.
Some farmland in Ashma, one of the 21 villages burned during the conflict, was cultivated in 2025. However, livestock entered the fields before the crops had even germinated, ruining the harvest.
Musa, a displaced resident from Joghan Damba east of Beliel
Groups accused of participating in the killings and village burnings have since taken control of agricultural land, he said. Pastoralists who once migrated seasonally northward during the nushouq grazing season and southward during the talqa season have increasingly settled in areas such as Ashma, Shangi, and Kamski east of Beliel. As a result, livestock now enter cultivated land and destroy crops.
Musa noted that some farmland in Ashma, one of the 21 villages burned during the conflict, was cultivated in 2025. However, livestock entered the fields before the crops had even germinated, ruining the harvest.
At the beginning of 2023, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo instructed authorities to rebuild the villages destroyed east of Beliel. Local officials subsequently constructed some houses and rehabilitated water sources in the area of Amouri in preparation for the return of displaced residents.
Yet Musa says the same groups that had originally forced people to flee returned only a month later, burning the houses once again, disabling water pumps, and looting the belongings of those who had come back.
In 2024, Beliel’s Native Administration, led by locality chief Abdel-Rahman Abu, launched an initiative aimed at helping families resume agricultural activities. Three committees were formed to cover the south-western, north-western, and eastern sectors of the locality.
According to Musa, however, these efforts have yet to produce meaningful results.
