SUDAN – The Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) shelling on El-Fasher on Thursday left at least 24 people dead and 55 others injured.

Sudan Doctors Network said in a statement that the RSF struck a central marketplace and the Awlad Al-Reef neighborhood in El-Fasher, killing 24 and injuring 55 people, including five women.

“This heinous crime adds to a series of war crimes and acts of genocide targeting unarmed civilians in El-Fasher for more than a year, amidst a tight siege and a severe shortage of food, medicine, and essential services,” the organization said.

It called on the international community to take urgent action to stop the deliberate shelling and the siege of the city through piling pressure on the leadership of the paramilitary group “to halt the ongoing genocide and systematic starvation of unarmed civilians in El-Fasher.”

El-Fasher has been under siege since May, with local groups repeatedly accusing the RSF of shelling civilian areas despite international calls to protect humanitarian corridors.

The army and RSF have been fighting a war since April 2023 that has killed more than 20,000 people and displaced 14 million, according to the UN and local authorities. Research from US universities, however, estimates the death toll at around 130,000.