Coordinated drone strikes in Khartoum broke months of relative calm in the Sudanese capital on Wednesday. Witnesses reported similar attacks in two northern cities at almost the same hour.
An AFP correspondent in Khartoum said the assault began around 5am local time. The sound of anti-aircraft fire rang out from the direction of the army’s Wadi Seidna base, just north of the twin city of Omdurman. The timing pointed to a coordinated operation rather than an isolated incident.
Residents in Atbara and El-Damer, two towns in Sudan’s River Nile state under army control, reported hearing explosions and seeing drones overhead within the same window. No group had claimed responsibility by the time of filing. There were no immediate reports of casualties from any of the three locations struck by the drone strikes in Khartoum and its northern neighbours.
The drone strikes in Khartoum mark a notable break from a period of comparative quiet. More than two million residents had returned to the capital since the army recaptured it from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces last year. That recapture pushed frontline fighting further west. Drone warfare, however, has continued to reach deep into army held territory regardless of distance from the front.
Sudan has been at war since April 2023. Rivalry between army chief Abdel Fattah al Burhan and his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, erupted into open conflict that year. The two men had jointly seized power in a 2021 coup before falling out over plans to integrate RSF fighters into the national army.
Wednesday’s drone strikes in Khartoum are not the first to reach the capital since the army’s return. They follow a lull that had allowed families to rebuild homes and reopen shops in neighbourhoods once abandoned to the fighting. Aid workers estimate the broader conflict has killed more than 200,000 people. It has also displaced millions more, producing what the United Nations calls the world’s largest hunger and displacement crisis.
Beyond the capital, the northern strikes fit a wider pattern this year. Drones have increasingly reached towns along the Nile that had largely been spared ground combat. Merowe, further west in Northern State, has been struck repeatedly. Past attacks there targeted the Merowe Dam, the local airport and army command positions, according to Sudan Tribune. Power outages linked to drone damage have periodically hit several northern towns.
The UN human rights office has repeatedly flagged the growing toll of drone attacks on civilians nationwide, even where drone strikes in Khartoum itself had briefly paused. Rights chief Volker Turk said in May that armed drones had become the leading cause of civilian deaths in the war. More than 1,000 civilians were killed in the first five months of 2026 alone, he said.
Just over a week before Wednesday’s attacks, a strike on a customary court in North Darfur’s Kabkabiya locality killed at least 37 people. The dead included tribal elders and local leaders, Sudan Tribune reported. The UN aid coordination office, OCHA, separately warned on 3 August that renewed drone activity in North Kordofan’s capital, El Obeid, was putting civilians and aid operations at risk. That warning came just days before the fresh drone strikes in Khartoum.
Sudanese authorities have not issued an official statement on Wednesday’s drone strikes in Khartoum. The RSF has neither confirmed nor denied involvement, a pattern consistent with previous attacks on the capital and northern towns. Military sources in past incidents have said ground based air defence systems intercepted most drones before they reached their targets. Wednesday’s outcome had yet to be confirmed by either side.
For residents who had only recently resumed something close to normal life, the renewed drone strikes in Khartoum revived fears the capital could again become a regular target. Sudan’s war edges toward its fourth year with no negotiated end in sight. Civilians in the north are once more being reminded that distance from the front offers little real protection.
