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Images by the Colorado-based firm Vantor show a fire at the Saudi hospital in El-Fasher on Thursday near a collection of white objects seen days earlier in other Vantor photos. The Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab described the images as showing the “burning of objects that may be consistent with bodies”. “The practice of burning bodies is not consistent with Islamic burial practices,” the Yale lab said. “The apparent immolation of objects that may be consistent with human remains complicates any future effort to count the number of people killed since the fall of El-Fasher and to identify and return the remains to family members.” Earlier satellite images of El-Fasher appear to show mass graves being dug and later covered at two sites in the city, one at a mosque just north of the Saudi hospital where some 460 people reportedly had been killed, and another by a former children’s hospital that the RSF had been using as a prison. The RSF has denied killing anyone at the Saudi hospital. However, evidence from those fleeing El-Fasher, online videos and satellite images offer an apocalyptic vision of the attack. The Sudanese army intercepted drones fired by the RSF on two cities in Sudan’s northeast, a military official said. The army official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said 15 drones targeted Atbara, a city north of the capital, in River Nile province. He confirmed that strikes caused no casualties. Local media reports said residents heard explosions. The official added that ground defences intercepted a smaller-scale drone attack that also targeted Omdurman, the sister city of the capital Khartoum. The RSF drone strikes come a day after the group announced that it agreed to a humanitarian truce proposed by a US-led mediator group known as the Quad. A Sudanese military official said the army welcomes the Quad’s proposal but will only agree to a truce when the RSF completely withdraws from civilian areas and give up weapons per previous peace proposals. The war between the RSF and the military began in 2023, when tensions erupted between the two former allies that were meant to oversee a democratic transition after a 2019 uprising. The fighting has killed at least 40,000 people, according to the WHO, and displaced 12 million.
