Deadly drone strikes in Sudan's 'nightmare' civil war — Global News Podcast

[0:00] Welcome to the Global News Podcast from the BBC. [0:04] I'm Charlotte Gallagher, and today we're joined by our Africa correspondent, [0:08] Barbara Pletuscher, who's in Nairobi. [0:11] Barbara, it's now three years since the start of the civil war in Sudan. [0:15] The UN says it's the worst humanitarian crisis in the world right now. [0:20] You've been there. What's going on on the ground? [0:23] It's absolutely staggering. [0:25] 33.7 million people are in need of some form of humanitarian aid. [0:29] That's food, that's water, that's medicine, that's shelter. [0:33] You have, especially in the conflict zones, pockets of famine, [0:37] millions of people existing on only one meal a day. [0:40] You have nearly 12 million people who have been forcibly displaced. [0:44] That's both inside and outside the country. [0:47] You have civilians having suffered from atrocities, [0:50] especially when one side takes territory from the other, [0:54] and especially, as we've heard many times, [0:56] the paramilitary rapid support forces taking over cities like Al-Fashir. [0:59] An increase in drone warfare, [1:02] so you see more and more civilians being killed by drones. [1:05] And you have nearly 12 million people, [1:09] mostly women and girls, that are at risk of rape. [1:12] Now, that figure has increased by around 350% [1:15] since the beginning of the war. [1:17] And you mentioned drones earlier, Barbara. [1:20] Where are they coming from and who's supplying these weapons? [1:23] So there has been an increase in drone warfare [1:26] over the past year in particular, I would say. [1:30] Both sides have them. [1:33] The rapid support forces is being armed by the United Arab Emirates, [1:37] so it's getting supplies funneled through, [1:40] from the United Arab Emirates through neighbouring countries to Sudan. [1:44] Now, the UAE denies this, but there's a lot of evidence for it. [1:47] The Sudanese armed forces have an air force, [1:51] so they have been using airplanes, warplanes to carry out military strikes. [1:56] But they have also increasingly been using drones. [1:59] And from what we understand, [2:00] they got some drones from Iran last year or the year before, [2:06] but now they are getting a lot of them from Turkey. [2:08] Again, quite sophisticated. [2:09] And given, Barbara, the scale of the suffering that you've outlined there, [2:15] and we've heard from the UN Human Rights Chief Volker Turk saying that his warnings haven't been heeded, [2:21] why do you think there hasn't been that attention and also action from world leaders? [2:26] Well, I think part of it is a bandwidth issue because other conflicts have taken precedence. [2:32] So you've had Ukraine, you've had Gaza, you have Iran now, [2:37] and Sudan hasn't been getting that kind of top-level diplomatic and government attention. [2:43] I think there is an impression that it is not as geopolitically significant as some of those other conflicts. [2:48] So there is that. [2:50] I think also it's important to say that there have been a lot of UN meetings, [2:56] UN resolutions, UN investigations, UN statements. [3:01] So there's been a lot of talk. [3:03] There's been a lot of discussion. [3:05] There's been a lot of criticism. [3:08] The United States has taken on board trying to get a ceasefire. [3:11] So there's a US envoy, Masad Boulus, [3:13] who's been trying very hard to get a peace deal or at least a humanitarian ceasefire. [3:19] So there has been work involved, but it hasn't been successful. [3:22] The RSF is supported by the United Arab Emirates, although the UAE denies that. [3:27] The army side, the Sudanese-led government, doesn't have a single patron in the same way, [3:32] but it does have support from Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, [3:35] and that support has been increasing and increasingly open. [3:38] And so they are getting supplies that allow them to keep fighting. [3:41] Now, that would be the source of trying to push the two parties together towards an agreement. [3:49] Now, that isn't happening for several reasons. [3:52] One, there's no pressure on these external backers to force them to stop the supply of weapons. [3:57] And analysts say that's because they have very good diplomatic and investment relations with the West, [4:04] especially Saudi Arabia and the UAE. [4:07] That's one. [4:07] Two, though, is that you need these parties at the table in the room to be able to help come up with a peace plan that will work. [4:15] And in fact, they are at the table. [4:17] There's a mechanism called the Quad, which is the U.S., Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt. [4:22] And they have talked about a peace plan. [4:24] They put it forward. [4:25] But they have not backed that with the high level diplomacy forcing the two sides to accept it. [4:33] And here, the army has been a stickler because the chief of the army keeps saying we will not even negotiate unless the RSF withdraws from the cities that it has taken, [4:46] unless it goes to designated areas and disarms, in effect, surrenders. [4:50] And Barbara, last year, President Trump said he would start working on Sudan. [4:55] And you mentioned that there is a U.S. envoy there trying to bring people together, the parties together. [5:01] How much does a ceasefire, any lasting kind of peace sort of hinge on the U.S. being involved? [5:07] And also, as you mentioned earlier, it's a bandwidth issue. [5:10] I mean, the U.S. has Iran, had Venezuela. [5:13] There's also involvement in Ukraine. [5:14] There is just so much going on. [5:16] We haven't seen any personal involvement from President Trump. [5:20] And, yes, there is a bandwidth issue, especially with the Iran war now. [5:24] But he has his envoy, and that envoy has continued to work. [5:29] So that envoy was also very instrumental in working together with this mechanism called the Quad, [5:37] which was Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt. [5:40] That started before the Trump administration. [5:42] The Americans have been working with this group. [5:44] And the recognition there is you need these outside actors in order to create an effective possibility for peace. [5:51] Now, they put out this peace agreement last September, and it was seen as, [5:56] ah, finally we've got a document, something that says this is what should happen, [6:00] and a little bit about how we should get there. [6:03] That was the first time it had happened. [6:05] But that hasn't gone anywhere. [6:07] You've had the RSF give verbal acceptance of parts of it. [6:12] But what analysts say is they know that the army isn't prepared to negotiate on these terms, [6:17] and so it's sort of safe for them to do that. [6:18] So it's a very complicated picture. [6:21] You don't have top-level, high-pressure diplomacy on this. [6:25] You don't have it from the U.S., and you don't have it from the external backers at this point. [6:31] And at the heart of this, you've got civilians in Sudan who no doubt feel totally desperate [6:38] and totally forgotten by the rest of the world. [6:40] Yes, I think that's very true. [6:43] I mean, there have been attempts by the U.N., by humanitarian agencies and so on [6:48] to try to get aid in, to try to raise the profile. [6:51] But the experience of people on the ground is that life is just getting worse and worse. [6:56] We had contact with a journalist who'd been in the city of Al-Fasher, [7:01] which was under RSF siege for quite a long time. [7:03] And then you had this very bloody and tumultuous takeover of the city last October. [7:09] And he said, you know, there is no international law. [7:12] There is no real world. [7:14] I mean, there's no U.N. [7:15] If there was, if there were international human rights organizations, [7:18] I wouldn't have seen what I saw in Al-Fasher for all those years. [7:22] I wouldn't have seen the starving and the killing and all the rest of it. [7:24] So that was quite a disillusioned statement. [7:28] Having said that, I do want to highlight that the Sudanese, [7:31] there's a lot of resilience in Sudan. [7:33] And you have local groups. [7:35] They're called emergency response rooms. [7:37] You also have community kitchens, people on the ground doing what they can [7:41] to help their fellow citizens. [7:43] And it's not just with food. [7:44] It's with emergency help, with medical help, all kinds of things. [7:48] They have been getting a lot of money from the diaspora, the Sudanese diaspora, [7:51] as well as, at least in the beginning of the conflict, they were using their own money. [7:55] But they're running out of money, too. [7:57] And so there has been this move by the U.N. agencies and the international agencies to say, [8:02] let's get more of the donor money that we have to these people, [8:05] because they're on the ground and they're able to actually get access to the people. [8:10] So you do see a lot of bravery, but you also see a lot of despair. [8:14] Thanks, Barbara. [8:17] That was the BBC's Africa correspondent, Barbara Pletuscher, in Nairobi. [8:21] And if you would like to hear more from the Global News podcast, [8:24] you can click the link below. [8:26] Thanks so much for watching.