The UN's top human rights official has issued an urgent warning that an imminent offensive against El Obeid, the capital of Sudan's North Kordofan state, carries the risk of serious international crimes and threatens to deepen an already catastrophic humanitarian crisis.
Volker Türk spoke out on Thursday following reports of a significant build-up of Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia and allied troops around the city, accompanied by intensified drone strikes and artillery shelling.
Sudan has been engulfed in war since April 2023, when fighting erupted between the formerly allied Sudanese Armed Forces and the RSF, plunging one of Africa's largest countries into a conflict that has become one of the world's worst humanitarian emergencies.
