KHARTOUM, Sudan/ISTANBUL

Darfur Governor Mini Arko Minnawi on Thursday accused the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of looting a marketplace in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur state in western Sudan.

Several media outlets in Sudan reported that a group affiliated with the RSF attacked the Nyala market and looted several shops and passers-by.

"What happened today in the city of Nyala—widespread looting of markets by soldiers and wounded members of the terrorist RSF militia—is not a random incident but comes within a systematic plan devised by the militia’s intelligence to directly target traders," who are mostly from specific ethnic communities, Minnawi said in a statement on Facebook.

He called the attack “a deliberate attempt to impoverish these communities and force them to flee, as part of a long-term plan for demographic change in the region.”

There was no immediate comment from the RSF on the accusation.

Nyala has been under the RSF control since October 2023 and was turned into a headquarters for the “Sudan Founding Alliance,” a coalition that announced the formation of a parallel government led by RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo in July.

Of Sudan’s 18 states, the RSF controls all five states of the Darfur region in the west, except for some northern parts of North Darfur that remain under army control. The army, in turn, holds most areas of the remaining 13 states in the south, north, east, and center, including the capital, Khartoum.

The conflict between the Sudanese army and the RSF, which began in April 2023, has since killed thousands of people and displaced millions of others.