The transformation of Sudan’s civil war into a transnational contest for technological superiority, its humanitarian and economic consequences, and the implications for international security, European strategic interests, arms-transfer governance and regional power competition.

Executive Summary — Bottom Line Up Front

Sudan is no longer merely a conventional civil war fought with increasingly sophisticated weapons. It is becoming a demonstration of how externally sustained military technology, transnational recruitment networks and fragmented political authority can collectively transform the security architecture of an entire region.

The expansion of unmanned aerial warfare between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) is changing the relationship between territorial control, military reach and civilian vulnerability.

The United Nations reported approximately 1,400 documented civilian deaths in January–June 2026, including some 1,100 attributed to drone strikes, representing nearly 79% of the deaths documented in that reporting period. This is not an estimate of all civilian deaths

On 3 July 2026, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights reported that 15 drone strikes in and around El Obeid between 6 and 28 June had killed at least 45 civilians and injured 41. Critical infrastructure, including fuel and water facilities, had also been struck.

The military significance extends beyond individual attacks. Long-range strike capabilities allow armed forces to impose economic, logistical and political costs without maintaining permanent control over the territory being targeted.

External military assistance, procurement intermediaries, foreign technical specialists and irregular recruitment structures are consequently becoming essential elements of the conflict’s endurance.

The strategic risk is not confined to Sudan. Chad, Libya, Egypt, Ethiopia and the wider Sahel face varying degrees of exposure to border militarisation, population movements, weapons diversion and the transmission of operational expertise.

For Europe, the consequences include threats to Red Sea stability, humanitarian financing, irregular migration pressures, sanctions enforcement and the integrity of military export-control systems.

The central assessment is that reducing the military effectiveness of individual drone systems will not be sufficient. International intervention must address the financing, procurement, technical support and political incentives that allow the wider war economy to regenerate military capabilities.

Africa’s New War Corridors: Russia, Sudan, DRC

Sudan’s Drone War Is Becoming a Test of Europe’s Strategic Credibility

Foreign military networks are extending the conflict while European governments finance its humanitarian consequences. The next two years will reveal whether sanctions and diplomacy can alter the economics of war.

Sudan’s war has exposed a contradiction in international security policy: foreign procurement networks continue to sustain military operations, while European governments commit billions to managing the humanitarian and economic consequences without demonstrating comparable influence over the resources that prolong the conflict. The contest between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which began on 15 April 2023, has evolved into a confrontation sustained by military-industrial companies, foreign recruitment organisations and internationally distributed financial relationships. For Europe, the consequences extend from Red Sea commercial connectivity to African regional stability, export controls and public expenditure. The central question is no longer whether international institutions can finance Sudan’s humanitarian emergency. It is whether the United States, European Union and their partners can constrain the military economy that repeatedly destroys the infrastructure and institutions their assistance is intended to preserve.

Military Reach Is Expanding Faster Than the Capacity to Protect Civilians

Sudan’s military geography has changed because control over territory no longer determines the distance over which armed organisations can impose costs. The SAF’s recapture of Khartoum in March 2025 restored its position in the historic capital, while the RSF’s capture of El Fasher in October 2025 consolidated a major western stronghold. Neither operation produced a settlement. Instead, long-range unmanned warfare has reduced the security advantage traditionally associated with distance from ground fighting, exposing transport facilities, electricity networks and population centres beyond the immediate front line.

The consequences are measurable. According to the United Nations Human Rights Office, more than 1,100 civilian deaths were attributed to drone strikes during January–June 2026, out of approximately 1,400 civilian deaths documented within the relevant monitoring record. In May 2026, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned that drones were enabling military operations to continue during the rainy season, when ground mobility had historically been constrained. The result is a change in the economics of conflict: an attacker can threaten dispersed infrastructure without occupying it, while defending authorities must finance protection and recovery across a much larger territory. UN Human Rights Office — May 2026.

Port Sudan demonstrated the mechanism in May 2025, when attacks affected its international airport, fuel infrastructure and electricity facilities. The United Nations reported disruption to humanitarian aviation and warned of consequences for the movement of assistance across Sudan. The significance lay less in the immediate physical damage than in the exposure of a national logistical centre to repeated interruption. A single damaged facility can impose costs on services operating hundreds of kilometres away, even when the attacking force cannot control the surrounding territory. United Nations in Sudan — May 2025.

The Figures Reveal a Conflict That Is Destroying Its Own Recovery Capacity

The financial and humanitarian indicators describe different parts of the same economic deterioration. By April 2026, the World Health Organization reported that 37% of Sudan’s healthcare facilities were nonfunctional and approximately 21 million people lacked access to essential healthcare. By 12 October, WHO had verified 228 attacks on healthcare since April 2023, associated with 2,055 deaths and 817 injuries. Its US$97.7 million humanitarian appeal was only 23% funded, leaving an approximate financing gap of US$75.2 million, calculated from the published figures. These numbers do not measure Sudan’s complete reconstruction requirements; they reveal the difference between identified emergency needs and the resources available to address them. World Health Organization — October 2026.

Infrastructure destruction also affects productive capacity. On 6 May 2025, the United Nations reported that a month-long electricity outage in Northern State had prevented irrigation pumps from operating, contributing to the destruction of more than 84 square kilometres of crops, equivalent to 8,400 hectares. This illustrates why power infrastructure cannot be treated simply as a collection of physical assets: interrupted electricity becomes lost agricultural output, reduced household income and increased dependence on food assistance. Repairing the installation does not recover a lost harvest. United Nations Secretary-General’s Briefing — May 2025.

Yet reconstruction remains technically possible where resources and access exist. During January–June 2026, UNICEF and its partners reported providing 6.6 million people with safe-water access, including approximately 2.2 million reached through the rehabilitation or construction of 120 urban water facilities. In Nyala, rehabilitation and solarisation improved water access for approximately 600,000 people. The figures reveal an uncomfortable policy choice: international donors can finance the restoration of civilian services, but continued attacks can repeatedly convert long-term investment into emergency replacement expenditure. UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Mid-Year Situation Report — August 2026.

Sudan’s War Economy Operates Through Companies, Not Just Commanders

International sanctions records establish that the capacity to sustain Sudan’s conflict extends beyond conventional military procurement. On 7 January 2025, the United States Treasury identified Capital Tap Holding L.L.C., based in the United Arab Emirates, as providing money and military equipment to the RSF. Treasury described a commercial group managing approximately 50 companies across ten countries and identified additional intermediaries connected to transactions involving RSF leadership. These findings establish documented corporate relationships; they do not, by themselves, establish direct responsibility by the Emirati government for every associated operation. U.S. Treasury — January 2025.

The same structural problem appears on the opposing side. On 26 June 2026, Treasury designated eight individuals and entities associated with military procurement and recruitment arrangements involving the SAF and RSF. The findings identified the SAF-linked Defense Industries System, the Giad industrial structure and Target Multiactivities Company Ltd. Treasury also reported that India-based SBL Energy Limited had supplied more than 200 shipments of explosives and related materials since 2024. The shipment count is not a verified tonnage or contract valuation, but it documents repeated international industrial procurement rather than an isolated transaction. U.S. Treasury — June 2026.

Foreign personnel provide another form of military capital. In December 2025, Treasury reported that hundreds of former Colombian military personnel had travelled to Sudan since September 2024 to support the RSF, including through drone operation, training and other specialised functions. The identified recruitment structure involved companies operating across Colombia and Panama, while subsequent sanctions in April 2026 addressed additional recruiters and successor entities. The commercial value of these networks lies not only in delivering personnel but also in transferring expertise that can survive the closure or designation of individual companies. U.S. Treasury — December 2025; U.S. Treasury — April 2026.

This creates a fundamental problem for economic enforcement. Designating a supplier is not the same as preventing its function from being replaced. A financial restriction may interrupt a transaction without eliminating existing equipment, trained personnel or alternative commercial relationships. The relevant measure of success is therefore the verified degradation of prohibited military-support functions, not the number of names added to sanctions lists.

Europe Is Funding Relief While Testing Its Ability to Restrict War Revenues

At the International Sudan Conference held in Berlin on 15 April 2026, representatives of 55 states participated in a process that mobilised approximately €1.5 billion in humanitarian commitments, including more than €811 million from the European Union and its member states. The Commission’s own announced contribution was €360.8 million, comprising €215.5 million for assistance inside Sudan and €145.3 million for the regional refugee response. These are commitments within overlapping financial aggregates, not amounts that can be added indiscriminately. Their political significance is clear: Europe has demonstrated an ability to mobilise relief financing, while the conversion of that financing into sustained access and functioning services remains contingent on conditions beyond donors’ control. European Commission — April 2026.

The European Union took a more explicitly economic-security decision on 13 July 2026, adopting restrictions on Sudanese-origin gold and specified chemicals used in gold extraction, alongside related services. The measures recognised that the conflict cannot be addressed exclusively through humanitarian finance or individual designations. Gold-related transactions require controls over product origin, financial relationships and applicable commercial services. Yet restricting access to the European market does not automatically eliminate sales elsewhere. The policy’s effectiveness will depend on actual enforcement and whether prohibited commercial relationships lose access to resources rather than migrate to alternative markets. Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The national division of responsibilities exposes a second contradiction. Italy has pursued operational humanitarian assistance through Italy for Sudan, reporting more than 130 tonnes of supplies and over €6 million in emergency contributions by May 2026. Germany reported a US$270 million national humanitarian contribution associated with Berlin, while the United Kingdom announced £146 million for Sudan in April 2026. France has used international diplomatic convening, including the Paris humanitarian conference of April 2024. Each instrument addresses a legitimate responsibility, but their coexistence does not establish an integrated European mechanism capable of measuring whether military financing, civilian insecurity and humanitarian dependence are declining together. Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs — May 2026; German Federal Foreign Office — June 2026; UK Government — April 2026.

The Legal Constraint Is Not the Absence of Rules but Their Unequal Reach

The United Nations arms restrictions concerning Darfur illustrate the limits of existing international governance. Security Council Resolutions 1556 (2004) and 1591 (2005) established and expanded an embargo directed at specified actors operating in Darfur. They did not establish an unrestricted prohibition on every arms transfer to every recipient throughout Sudan. This distinction matters because the conflict’s procurement relationships involve multiple organisations, jurisdictions and potential transfer routes. United Nations Security Council — Sudan Sanctions Committee.

The temporal limits of the regime require equal precision. Security Council Resolution 2828 (2026) renewed the relevant sanctions measures until 9 October 2026 while extending the Panel of Experts’ mandate until 9 November. The cited resolution alone does not establish that the restrictions remained operative after 9 October; that determination requires the applicable subsequent decision. A monitoring mandate and the legal continuation of restrictive measures cannot be treated as equivalent. United Nations Security Council Resolution 2828 — September 2026.

The Arms Trade Treaty provides additional rules for states parties through Article 6 prohibitions, Article 7 export-risk assessments and Article 11 diversion-prevention obligations. Yet its coverage depends on the type of equipment, transaction and obligations binding the state concerned. It does not automatically prohibit every civilian drone, component or commercial service. Nor does it transform manufacturing origin into proof of governmental responsibility for a subsequent battlefield operation. The practical enforcement problem is identifying the legally relevant transfer and connecting it to a documented recipient, end use and applicable prohibition. Arms Trade Treaty — Official Treaty Repository.

The International Court of Justice’s 5 May 2025 decision in Sudan v. United Arab Emirates reinforces the importance of legal distinctions. The Court removed the case from its General List because it manifestly lacked jurisdiction under the relevant circumstances; it did not adjudicate the merits of Sudan’s allegations concerning Emirati support. A jurisdictional decision does not establish either the truth or falsity of the underlying claims. For governments considering financial restrictions or diplomatic measures, the difference between documented corporate conduct, allegations of state involvement and judicially established responsibility is consequential. International Court of Justice — Sudan v. United Arab Emirates — May 2025.

The External Contest Is Over Influence, Access and the Cost of Enforcement

Sudan’s external relationships cannot be reduced to a single confrontation between foreign alliances. The U.S. Treasury identified SAF procurement priorities involving Iranian drones in October 2024 and referred to a prospective Russian arrangement concerning maritime access. Turkish commercial suppliers appear in subsequent procurement findings, while Chinese-origin military technologies raise separate questions concerning export provenance and diversion. These relationships differ in legal form and strategic importance. An announced maritime arrangement is not an operational naval base, and an equipment manufacturer’s nationality does not establish who authorised every subsequent transfer. U.S. Treasury — October 2024; U.S. Treasury — June 2026.

The Red Sea adds an industrial and commercial consequence for Europe. EUNAVFOR ASPIDES, established in February 2024, had supported the passage of more than 2,390 merchant vessels and closely protected more than 720 by August 2026. Its defensive mandate addresses the wider maritime-security environment, not an automatic intervention mandate in Sudan. The distinction matters for Italy and other economies dependent on Suez connectivity: Sudanese instability can compound risks to regional infrastructure without being responsible for every threat to commercial navigation. European External Action Service — EUNAVFOR ASPIDES — August 2026.

The consequences are also institutional. The African Union, European Union, France, Germany, United Kingdom and United States reaffirmed support for Sudanese political dialogue at their September 2026 ministerial meeting. But the coexistence of diplomatic processes, national sanctions and humanitarian commitments exposes the absence of a single enforceable arrangement linking reduced military supply to verified changes in armed conduct. Foreign governments can restrict particular transactions and fund civilian recovery; they cannot assume that either action, conducted independently, will generate a national political settlement. France Diplomatie — September 2026.

The Next 24 Months Will Determine Whether Europe Finances Recovery or Repeated Replacement

Between October 2026 and October 2028, the decisive test will be whether international pressure produces three observable results: a sustained reduction in attacks on civilians and essential infrastructure, documented disruption of prohibited procurement and recruitment networks, and enforceable arrangements allowing Sudanese civilian institutions to recover. The Berlin conference’s political framework and the United States’ June 2026 proposal for a three-month humanitarian truce provide diplomatic instruments, but neither establishes that the belligerents have accepted a durable settlement or that their associated formations can reliably enforce one.

The cost of failure is already distributed. Sudanese households pay through lost services, displaced livelihoods and disrupted education. Chad, Egypt and other host countries bear additional demands on public institutions; UNHCR’s 2026 regional response plan required US$1.6 billion to address a planning population of 5.9 million. European taxpayers finance humanitarian commitments, while industrial and commercial operators face persistent uncertainty affecting regional transport and legally regulated transactions. These are not interchangeable costs, but they are consequences of the same failure to reduce the conflict’s capacity for regeneration. UNHCR Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan — February 2026.

The choice for European governments is therefore fiscal as well as diplomatic. Continuing to fund relief while failing to measure the effectiveness of export restrictions, financial enforcement and political commitments risks creating a recurring expenditure model in which restored civilian capacity is destroyed faster than durable institutions can protect it. Over the next 12–24 months, the price of inaction will fall first on Sudanese civilians and neighbouring states, but it will also appear in European aid budgets, compliance costs and regional-security commitments. The relevant measure of policy success is whether those expenditures begin to reduce the underlying demand for further expenditure.

STRATEGIC DISENGAGEMENT IN THE GLOBAL MEDIA ARCHITECTURE: HOW THE SYRIAN-SUDANESE AXIS AND FOREIGN INVESTMENT REGIMES FORCED SKY GROUP’S UAE EXIT

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Navigational Index

PILLAR I — THE TRANSFORMATION OF SUDAN’S MILITARY AND POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY

• Chapter 1. The Evolution of the Conflict and the Transformation of Military Power
• Chapter 2. Unmanned Warfare, Air Defence and the New Economics of Military Reach
• Chapter 3. Civilian Infrastructure, Humanitarian Security and Territorial Fragmentation

PILLAR II — THE INTERNATIONALISATION OF THE CONFLICT

• Chapter 4. External Powers, Military Supply Networks and the Geopolitics of Sudan
• Chapter 5. Regional Spillover: Chad, Egypt, Libya, Ethiopia, the Sahel and the Red Sea
• Chapter 6. Economic Warfare, International Law, Sanctions and Arms-Transfer Governance

PILLAR III — EUROPEAN SECURITY AND THE FUTURE STRATEGIC ORDER

• Chapter 7. Strategic Implications for Italy, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union and NATO
• Chapter 8. The 2026–2031 Outlook: Escalation Pathways, Policy Options and Final Strategic Assessment

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ASYMMETRIC SPILLOVER AND THE SUDAN-SAHEL ARMS NEXUS

Master Abstract

A conflict undergoing structural transformation

The conflict that began on 15 April 2023 has progressively evolved into a multidimensional struggle involving conventional military forces, paramilitary formations, local armed movements, foreign-supported supply structures and a growing collection of remotely operated weapons. Its consequences are no longer adequately described through the conventional distinction between government-held and insurgent-held territory.

The operational expansion of unmanned aerial systems is altering the value of territorial control itself. Where earlier phases of the conflict depended extensively on ground mobility, urban strongholds and control of transport corridors, longer-range strike systems increasingly permit belligerents to disrupt essential services, logistics and economic activity at considerable distances from their established positions. A city may therefore remain outside the immediate reach of an opposing ground force while remaining exposed to aerial attack.

This development creates a strategic asymmetry between military control and economic recovery. The restoration of governmental authority over an urban centre does not necessarily restore security for its residents, infrastructure operators, commercial enterprises or returning displaced populations. Military advances on the ground may coexist with persistent vulnerability from the air. Consequently, battlefield success can fail to produce political stabilisation.

The central strategic question is whether the international community can interrupt this cycle before drone-enabled coercion becomes a permanent feature of fragmented state authority in Sudan and a transferable operating model for other armed organisations.

The erosion of the distinction between front line and civilian rear area

Sudan’s air-war transformation is producing a second-order consequence of particular importance: the progressive disappearance of a reliably secure civilian rear area.

In a conventional territorial conflict, infrastructure far from the principal front line may retain enough security to sustain public administration, humanitarian operations and partial economic activity. Long-range unmanned systems weaken that assumption by creating opportunities to attack energy distribution, fuel storage, transport facilities and communication nodes without capturing them.

The United Nations has documented strikes affecting markets, schools, fuel facilities, water infrastructure and civilian vehicles, while identifying increasingly severe shortages of essential services in contested parts of Kordofan. The consequences extend beyond direct casualties: electricity disruptions affect water pumping, interrupted fuel distribution constrains transportation and healthcare, and damaged infrastructure raises the costs of humanitarian assistance.

The strategic effect is cumulative. Repeated infrastructure disruption can suppress economic recovery even where physical reconstruction is technically possible. Investors, humanitarian organisations, displaced households and public authorities face increased uncertainty over whether restored assets can remain operational.

This dynamic also changes the economic meaning of displacement. Population movements become not merely a consequence of territorial fighting but a continuing response to the perceived inability of authorities to guarantee the basic conditions necessary for civilian life.

The international military supply system as a strategic actor

The endurance of Sudan’s war cannot be understood solely through the decisions of its principal domestic belligerents.

On 9 December 2025, the United States Treasury identified a transnational recruitment structure that had facilitated the deployment of former Colombian military personnel to support the RSF. The department described the provision of expertise in drone operation, ground combat and military training, alongside corporate arrangements spanning several jurisdictions.

Subsequent Treasury actions in April and June 2026 expanded measures against recruitment and military procurement networks. The June action also targeted procurement structures supporting the SAF, demonstrating that international supply chains sustain military activity on both sides.

This pattern establishes a significant distinction between access to weapons and access to military capability. The acquisition of unmanned aircraft does not automatically establish effective operational use. Sustained capability may depend on specialised personnel, maintenance arrangements, spare parts, secure communications, technical adaptation and access to external funding.

The resulting vulnerability is therefore distributed across multiple jurisdictions. An effective sanctions or export-control response must identify the entities that provide critical services, not merely the organisations that ultimately deploy the weapons.

At the same time, allegations concerning foreign-state involvement require separate evaluation. The documented activities of a recruitment network based in a particular country do not, by themselves, establish the responsibility of that country’s government for every associated military operation.

Sudan as a regional security transmission mechanism

The geographical position of Sudan gives the conflict implications far beyond its national borders.

To the west, Chad and Libya are exposed to refugee movements, cross-border instability and the security consequences of armed networks operating across difficult-to-control frontier regions. To the northeast, Egypt has direct interests in the security of Sudan, Nile-related infrastructure and the preservation of a functioning state along its southern border. To the east, instability near Ethiopia and the Blue Nile region creates additional pressures on neighbouring communities and security institutions.

The August 2026 Security Council briefing described renewed fighting near Sudan’s borders, attacks affecting populations around the Sudan–Chad frontier, and growing insecurity near Ethiopia. It also warned that continuing external military assistance was contributing to the complexity and fragmentation of the war.

A further risk concerns the circulation of operational knowledge. The transfer of sophisticated weapons to additional armed organisations is not inevitable, and the existence of a recruitment or smuggling route does not establish such transfers. Nevertheless, networks that connect armed personnel, technical expertise and illicit procurement can lower the organisational barriers to the later adoption of more advanced military systems.

For European governments, the most consequential concern is therefore not an immediate assumption that Sudanese military drones will be deployed elsewhere. It is the possibility that the institutional and commercial networks supporting Sudan’s conflict could become reusable structures for other regional crises.

The European dimension: strategic exposure without geographical proximity

Europe’s exposure to Sudan’s instability is indirect but strategically relevant.

Italy’s interests are shaped by Mediterranean security, instability along the wider North African and Sahelian migration routes, humanitarian diplomacy and trade flows connected to the Red Sea and Suez Canal.

France faces a different combination of pressures. Its interests include Red Sea maritime security, the political future of Francophone Africa, relations with Chad and the broader problem of armed-group proliferation across the Sahel.

Germany’s principal exposure lies in humanitarian financing, European economic resilience, industrial export compliance and the sustainability of international stabilisation mechanisms.

The United Kingdom combines humanitarian, diplomatic, maritime and financial interests, together with responsibilities arising from its role in the United Nations Security Council system.

The European Union has already moved beyond individual listings toward measures intended to restrict conflict financing. On 13 July 2026, the Council adopted restrictions on Sudanese-origin gold and on specified chemicals used in gold extraction, accompanied by related service prohibitions. These measures establish a significant precedent for targeting the economic structures sustaining the conflict rather than focusing exclusively on individual commanders.

The decisive test will be implementation: whether financial supervision, trade controls and international cooperation can substantially constrain procurement and revenue networks without disproportionately obstructing legitimate humanitarian activity or eventual economic reconstruction.

The five-year strategic judgment

Over the 2026–2031 horizon, Sudan faces three broad pathways: prolonged military fragmentation accompanied by recurrent infrastructure attacks; negotiated de-escalation with incomplete demilitarisation; or a wider regional crisis involving deeper cross-border military activity and the further diffusion of advanced operational capabilities.

These pathways are not equally supported by current evidence, and they are not mutually exclusive at every stage. A negotiated humanitarian pause, for example, could coexist with persistent armed fragmentation. Regional spillover could intensify even without either principal belligerent achieving a decisive military breakthrough.

The near-term concern is the persistence of military incentives that reward continued access to external materiel and financing. The documented recruitment networks, continued attacks on civilian infrastructure and high levels of displacement all indicate that restoring territorial control alone is unlikely to produce a durable settlement.

The outlook would materially improve if measurable reductions occurred simultaneously in civilian-directed attacks, external procurement, military recruitment and obstruction of humanitarian access. Conversely, the expansion of documented cross-border military activity, the continued destruction of essential infrastructure and the emergence of additional sophisticated armed operators would strengthen the assessment that the conflict is becoming a more durable regional security system.

Key Evidence and Strategic Indicators

The following indicators establish the principal quantitative and institutional baseline for assessing military escalation, civilian vulnerability, international involvement and policy effectiveness.

Indicator	Value or documented status	Reference period	Institution
Civilian deaths documented	Approximately 1,400	January–June 2026	UN/OHCHR
Civilian deaths attributed to drone strikes	Approximately 1,100, or 79% of the above total	January–June 2026	UN/OHCHR
El Obeid drone attacks	15 documented strikes; at least 45 killed and 41 injured	6–28 June 2026	OHCHR
Total forcibly displaced	11,321,158	UNHCR dashboard, updated 5 October 2026	UNHCR and partners
Internally displaced persons	6,409,546	Updated 20 September 2026	IOM/OCHA
Newly arrived refugees and asylum seekers outside Sudan	3,695,741	Updated 5 October 2026	UNHCR and partners
Foreign military recruitment	Hundreds of former Colombian military personnel identified as supporting the RSF	Since September 2024	U.S. Treasury
Military procurement sanctions	Eight individuals and entities targeted in one enforcement action concerning recruitment and procurement networks supporting the belligerents	26 June 2026	U.S. Treasury
EU conflict-financing measures	Restrictions on Sudanese gold and specified gold-extraction chemicals	13 July 2026	Council of the EU
UN Darfur sanctions	Resolution 2828 (2026) renewed measures through 9 October 2026 and extended the Panel of Experts mandate to 9 November 2026	11 September 2026 resolution	UN Security Council

Official records:

The displacement indicators have different populations and reference dates and should not be added mechanically. The recorded civilian fatality figures are also subject to substantial monitoring limitations and cannot be interpreted as a complete national mortality estimate.

The Security Council’s September 2026 renewal specified 9 October 2026 as the expiry date of the sanctions measures. The official record reviewed here does not establish whether a further renewal had entered into effect by 15 October 2026; their continued applicability after that date therefore requires confirmation against the subsequent operative instrument.

The Strategic Consequences: Seven Interconnected Risks

The militarisation of national reconstruction

Infrastructure recovery becomes substantially more expensive when civilian facilities remain within the operational reach of long-range weapons. Reconstruction planning must therefore address not only physical rebuilding but also the protection, redundancy and continuity of essential services.

An electricity installation or water station can be repaired, but an operator cannot guarantee uninterrupted service where the facility remains repeatedly exposed to attack. The consequences extend into public finance, commercial lending, humanitarian funding and household decisions to return.

The emergence of a transnational military-services economy

The involvement of foreign personnel and commercial intermediaries demonstrates that military capabilities can be supplied through organisational structures extending well beyond traditional arms transactions.

This creates enforcement challenges for national financial-intelligence authorities, customs agencies, export-control bodies and commercial banks. A weapons embargo that neglects recruitment, financing, technical services and diversion pathways may constrain only part of the operational system.

Regional escalation without a formal interstate war

Sudan’s conflict could spread through isolated border incidents, armed-group movement, logistical support and diplomatic retaliation without producing a declared interstate conflict.

Such developments would be especially difficult to manage because they involve varying degrees of state responsibility, disputed allegations, informal military relationships and weakly controlled frontier territories.

The increasing fragility of humanitarian access

The security of humanitarian corridors depends upon considerably more than access agreements between armed commanders. It also requires predictable transport, functioning fuel supplies, protected medical facilities and reliable communications.

Repeated attacks against infrastructure can undermine aid operations even without a direct strike against humanitarian personnel. Consequently, civilian protection and infrastructure continuity must be treated as mutually reinforcing elements of humanitarian diplomacy.

The risk of technological diffusion

The conflict demonstrates the potential value of combining remotely operated platforms with external technical assistance, adaptable communications and relatively mobile military organisations.

The principal proliferation danger concerns the circulation of knowledge, operators and supply relationships. Advanced capabilities may become easier to reproduce when expertise moves between conflicts, although the actual transfer of complete systems or techniques to other armed organisations requires specific evidence.

The expansion of sanctions and financial-compliance exposure

The EU’s July 2026 measures indicate a policy shift toward undermining the financial foundations of the war economy.

For European companies, banks, trading houses and logistics operators, this increases the importance of supply-chain due diligence, commodity origin verification, beneficial-ownership identification and compliance with applicable restrictive measures.

The difficulty is that enforcement must simultaneously minimise sanctions evasion and preserve legitimate humanitarian exemptions.

The fragmentation of international diplomatic leverage

The actors capable of influencing Sudan’s belligerents do not necessarily share identical regional interests, military relationships or preferred political outcomes.

Consequently, coordinated international policy may be constrained less by a shortage of diplomatic statements than by the absence of aligned incentives among the parties financing, supplying or politically supporting competing military structures.

Competing Strategic Pathways, 2026–2031

The following assessment differentiates three possible trajectories. These are analytical scenarios rather than quantified forecasts.

Pathway	Supporting mechanisms	Countervailing factors	Current assessment
Prolonged military fragmentation	External procurement, distributed financing, territorial competition and drone-enabled strikes	Financial pressure, exhaustion, local agreements and external diplomatic intervention	Strongly consistent with the documented conflict dynamics
Negotiated but fragile de-escalation	Diplomatic engagement, humanitarian pressure, sanctions and potentially convergent interests among external actors	Fragmented command structures, mistrust and incentives to retain armed capabilities	Possible, but implementation and monitoring remain decisive weaknesses
Intensified regional spillover	Border insecurity, military recruitment networks, refugee pressures and foreign involvement	Neighbouring states’ incentives to avoid escalation and diplomatic containment mechanisms	Credible strategic danger, but a major regional war is not established as inevitable

The most defensible near-term assessment is that military fragmentation and continued pressure on civilian infrastructure present a more immediate risk than a comprehensive political settlement.

This judgment reflects the continued documented use of drones, external recruitment arrangements, recurring attacks around major population centres and persistent humanitarian displacement.

It does not imply that military fragmentation must persist throughout the five-year horizon. Changes in external supply, financial resources, military cohesion or the credibility of a negotiated security framework could substantially alter that trajectory.

Principal Intelligence Gaps and Watch Indicators

Strategic question	Observable indicator	Consequence for the assessment
Can external procurement be materially constrained?	New official sanctions disclosures, customs seizures, documented diversion routes and supplier disruptions	Persistent supply despite enforcement would indicate limited effectiveness
Is the conflict becoming more regionalised?	Verified military incidents across borders, official complaints and documented foreign deployments	Repeated independently substantiated incidents would strengthen the regional-escalation assessment
Are drone capabilities spreading beyond the principal belligerents?	Verified identification of operators, platforms and logistical support among additional armed groups	Would indicate proliferation beyond the current principal combatants
Can civilian reconstruction proceed?	Sustained operation of power, water, health and transport infrastructure, alongside reduced attack frequency	Improved continuity would support assessments of stabilisation
Are sanctions affecting the war economy?	Documented shifts in financial flows, procurement arrangements and commodity-trade enforcement	Would permit evaluation of practical effectiveness rather than nominal coverage
Is a negotiated ceasefire becoming enforceable?	Documented commitments, functioning monitoring arrangements, verifiable reductions in attacks and sustained humanitarian access	Would strengthen the de-escalation pathway

These indicators should be evaluated together. A decline in one category of attacks does not necessarily establish a durable improvement if procurement, recruitment and infrastructure destruction continue through other means.

Preliminary Strategic Policy Assessment

The most consequential policy choice is whether international actors continue responding predominantly to discrete military incidents or adopt a coordinated approach to the economic and institutional structures sustaining the conflict.

Three complementary courses of action emerge.

First, the United Nations and its member states should prioritise verifiable civilian-protection measures, including documented cessation of attacks on essential civilian facilities, protected humanitarian access and mechanisms capable of identifying violations. Negotiation may be initiated rapidly, but implementation would require cooperation among the belligerents, credible monitoring and sustained diplomatic pressure.

Second, the European Union, United Kingdom, United States and relevant regional authorities should improve coordination on military procurement, technical services and financial enforcement. Competent sanctions authorities could strengthen lawful intelligence-sharing and target documented facilitators, subject to the evidentiary requirements of their respective legal systems. The principal implementation burden would fall on financial supervisors, export-control authorities, customs bodies and investigative institutions. These measures are potentially reversible, but their effectiveness depends on international cooperation and careful protection of legitimate trade and humanitarian activity.

Third, regional diplomacy should link Sudan’s political settlement to neighbouring states’ border-security interests. The African Union, relevant regional organisations, neighbouring governments and international partners could pursue arrangements addressing cross-border armed activity, civilian movements and humanitarian corridors. Such measures would be difficult to sustain without an accompanying domestic political process and safeguards against using counter-smuggling or border-security operations to obstruct displaced populations.

The essential distinction is between military containment and political stabilisation. The former seeks to reduce the capacity to inflict harm. The latter requires institutions, credible security guarantees, economic recovery and a political arrangement capable of surviving renewed competition among armed actors.

An international strategy that achieves only the first objective may reduce immediate violence without eliminating the conditions from which the conflict continues to regenerate.

Final Assessment of the Dossier Opening

Sudan’s accelerating use of unmanned warfare illustrates a wider transformation in contemporary security: the growing ability of fragmented armed organisations to impose strategic costs on states, civilian populations and neighbouring territories without achieving conventional military superiority.

The repercussions extend across several interconnected systems. Military technology changes the geography of violence; infrastructure attacks undermine economic recovery; foreign recruitment and supply networks sustain combat operations; displacement strains neighbouring states; and international commercial relationships create legal and financial exposure beyond the battlefield.

The resulting challenge cannot be addressed through a single arms embargo, military technology restriction or diplomatic initiative.

What is required is an integrated policy capable of constraining the resources that sustain military operations, protecting essential civilian infrastructure, improving accountability, supporting humanitarian access and establishing credible incentives for a political settlement.

Sudan’s future will be determined not simply by which force controls more territory, but by whether military power can be separated from the transnational networks and economic incentives that currently sustain the conflict.

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Chapter 1. The Evolution of the Conflict and the Transformation of Military Power

The Collapse of Sudan’s Political-Military Order and the Emergence of a Fragmented System of Sovereignty

Sudan’s war is the consequence of a deeper institutional failure in which competing military organisations acquired the resources, autonomy and political authority necessary to challenge the state from within. The decisive historical development was not simply the confrontation between two commanders in April 2023, but the progressive separation of coercive power from accountable civilian government, accompanied by an unresolved struggle over military integration, access to economic resources, territorial administration and the distribution of sovereign authority. By October 2026, this struggle had developed into a geographically fragmented conflict in which the Sudanese Armed Forces retained important instruments of formal state authority, while the Rapid Support Forces exercised substantial territorial and military power in parts of western Sudan. The resulting political order cannot be adequately described as a conventional state confronting an external rebellion, because both principal belligerents emerged from the country’s previous security structure and participated, at different stages, in its transitional governing arrangements.

The central analytical finding is that Sudan is experiencing a simultaneous crisis of military hierarchy, political legitimacy and territorial sovereignty. Military success in one region does not necessarily translate into nationwide administrative authority, while the control of a population centre does not automatically establish the capacity to govern its surrounding territory. The conflict has therefore evolved beyond the question of which organisation can defeat the other militarily. It now concerns whether a single national institutional structure can be reconstructed after the decomposition of the political arrangements that once connected the armed forces, paramilitary formations, regional armed movements and civilian political actors.

This distinction is essential for understanding the geographical and military developments that followed the recapture of Khartoum by the SAF in March 2025 and the subsequent RSF capture of El Fasher in October 2025. These events represented major but geographically distinct shifts in military power. The first substantially strengthened the army’s position in central Sudan and restored its control over the historic national capital. The second consolidated the RSF’s position in Darfur and weakened one of the most important remaining centres of SAF-aligned military resistance in the region. Neither development, considered independently, produced a nationwide political settlement. Instead, their combined consequences contributed to a more pronounced territorial separation between competing centres of military authority.

The United Nations’ investigation into El Fasher, published on 13 February 2026, provides an especially significant documentary reference because it identifies the city’s strategic importance, the preceding siege, the participation of SAF-aligned armed movements and the military consequences of the RSF offensive. The report describes how the RSF had consolidated control over four of Darfur’s five states by late November 2023, while El Fasher remained under the SAF and allied forces until late October 2025. Human Rights Violations and Abuses During the RSF Offensive and Capture of El Fasher — United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights — February 2026.

The developments of 2025 and 2026 consequently indicate a transformation in the conflict’s strategic geography rather than the straightforward advance of one side toward an inevitable military victory. The army’s ability to recover important administrative centres has coexisted with the RSF’s capacity to sustain operations elsewhere, while additional armed organisations and regional political interests have complicated any attempt to reduce the conflict to a bilateral contest. The fundamental measure of military power in Sudan is increasingly the ability to maintain functioning forces, logistics, political alliances and administrative influence across disconnected territorial environments, rather than possession of a single capital or military installation.

The Institutional Origins of the Conflict: From the 2019 Transition to the Breakdown of Military Integration

The fall of President Omar al-Bashir in April 2019 created an opportunity to restructure the relationship between Sudan’s armed institutions and civilian government. The agreement signed on 17 August 2019 between the Forces for Freedom and Change and the Transitional Military Council established a transitional political framework intended to provide a pathway towards civilian-led governance. The United Nations Security Council welcomed that agreement and the inauguration of the Sovereign Council and prime minister later in August, while emphasising the importance of political transition, institutional consolidation and peace. Security Council Press Statement on Sudan — United Nations Security Council — August 2019.

The principal structural weakness of this arrangement was that the transition required political cooperation among institutions whose interests were not necessarily compatible. The SAF remained the established national military institution, possessing conventional armed capabilities and an organisational hierarchy developed through the Sudanese state. The RSF, by contrast, had evolved from the paramilitary structures associated with the conflict in Darfur into a substantially more powerful formation with its own command relationships and capacity to operate independently. Its historical association with the Janjaweed militias and its subsequent incorporation into Sudan’s formal security arrangements gave it a hybrid character: it was neither an ordinary civilian political organisation nor simply an informal insurgent movement operating outside the state’s previous coercive architecture.

The transition therefore inherited a basic contradiction. The political objective was to create accountable national institutions, while the coercive resources required to enforce that authority remained distributed among military organisations whose commanders possessed substantial independent power. This generated what can be described as a dual-command sovereignty problem: the formal institutions of the state could claim ultimate authority over national security, but the practical ability to direct all armed formations through a single operational hierarchy had not been achieved. Such arrangements can persist during periods of political accommodation, but they become unstable when leaders disagree over appointments, force integration, budgets, military deployments or the future balance of political power.

The Juba Peace Agreement, signed in October 2020 after negotiations involving Sudan’s transitional authorities and several armed movements, introduced another important dimension into this already complex environment. The agreement aimed to address longstanding conflicts in Darfur and other regions through political and security arrangements, including provisions related to representation and the transformation of armed structures. It was a significant institutional attempt to incorporate previously excluded armed actors into a national political framework. However, the coexistence of multiple armed organisations, varying implementation requirements and unresolved security-sector reform created a difficult environment in which political commitments could not immediately produce unified command and control. Statement on the Juba Peace Agreement — United Nations Secretary-General — August 2020.

In June 2020, the Security Council established the United Nations Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan, or UNITAMS, with responsibilities that included supporting democratic transition, peace negotiations, constitutional development, accountable security institutions and the protection of civilians. The mission’s mandate reflected the international recognition that successful political transition required more than an agreement among senior political figures. It required the establishment of institutions capable of resolving disputes and gradually replacing fragmented military authority with a more coherent and accountable state structure. Security Council Establishes Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan, Resolution 2524 — United Nations Security Council — June 2020.

The military takeover of 25 October 2021 severely weakened this process. Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and other senior civilian figures were detained, political institutions were disrupted, and the relationship between Sudan’s military leadership and civilian political forces deteriorated. Although an agreement announced on 21 November 2021 sought to address the immediate constitutional crisis, the United Nations reported continued political opposition, deaths among demonstrators and major unresolved questions concerning the future of the transition. Security Council Briefing on Sudan’s Political Transition — United Nations Security Council — December 2021.

The implications of the 2021 military intervention were profound. It substantially weakened the institutions that might otherwise have mediated disputes between competing armed organisations, reduced civilian influence over security policy and intensified the dependence of the political system on agreements negotiated among military leaders. This created an increasingly narrow institutional foundation for managing the relationship between the SAF and RSF. When disagreements over security-sector reform subsequently became more acute, Sudan lacked an effective civilian authority capable of resolving them through established constitutional procedures.

In December 2022, Sudanese military and civilian actors signed a political framework agreement intended to restore a credible transition towards civilian government. By March 2023, the United Nations was reporting progress in political consultations, but it also identified security-sector reform, implementation of the Juba Peace Agreement, transitional justice and the integration of armed formations as unresolved matters. A further workshop concerning the integration of the RSF and other armed movements into a national professional army was anticipated. Security Council Briefing on Sudan’s Political Framework Agreement and Security-Sector Reform — United Nations Security Council — March 2023.

This chronology is particularly important because it demonstrates that the war did not originate in the absence of diplomatic dialogue. On the contrary, armed confrontation erupted during an active political process in which the future organisation of military power had become a central negotiating issue. The immediate failure was the inability to transform a political commitment to military integration into an enforceable institutional arrangement accepted by those who controlled the principal armed organisations. The outbreak of fighting on 15 April 2023 converted this unresolved institutional conflict into a nationwide war.

Table 1 — Institutional Decisions and Their Consequences for Sudan’s Military Order

Period and institutional development	Documented political or security objective	Structural limitation	Long-term military consequence
August 2019: Constitutional transition	Establish transitional institutions and a pathway towards civilian government	Military power remained distributed among competing security organisations	Civilian authority depended on continued cooperation between armed leaders
October 2020: Juba Peace Agreement	Integrate peace arrangements into national political and security institutions	Multiple armed movements required distinct implementation, command and representation arrangements	The security architecture remained organisationally fragmented
October 2021: Military takeover	Military leaders displaced the existing civilian-led transitional arrangement	Civilian institutions lost authority and mediation capacity	Disputes over command and security-sector reform became harder to resolve institutionally
December 2022: Political Framework Agreement	Restore a civilian political transition and address institutional reform	Critical questions concerning military integration were unresolved	The future command structure became a central dispute between armed organisations
April 2023: SAF–RSF war	Armed confrontation displaced the negotiated political process	No functioning unified command capable of preventing escalation	Rival military structures developed into independent wartime centres of territorial power
December 2023: Termination of UNITAMS mandate	End the existing UN political mission through Security Council Resolution 2715	The political mission’s institutional framework was wound down during active hostilities	International engagement continued without the same dedicated in-country political mission structure

The documentary basis for the final institutional transition is Security Council Resolution 2715: Termination of UNITAMS — United Nations Security Council — December 2023. The table identifies institutional developments and analytically distinguishes their documented objectives from the structural consequences that followed.

The significance of this history extends beyond assigning responsibility for the initial collapse. It establishes a requirement for any future settlement: a ceasefire that leaves the relationship between armed authority, civilian government and military integration unresolved would reproduce an important institutional vulnerability of the pre-war political order. The creation of a national security framework would therefore require clear arrangements for command responsibility, legal accountability, demobilisation or integration, civilian oversight, financing and the management of regional armed movements. Without these arrangements, a negotiated cessation of hostilities could interrupt military operations while preserving the competing structures capable of resuming them.

The First Military Transformation, 2023–2024: From the Battle for Khartoum to Competing Regional War Systems

The opening phase of the conflict demonstrated the different operational characteristics of Sudan’s principal armed organisations. The SAF possessed the established military hierarchy, conventional armed forces and institutional continuity associated with a national army. The RSF possessed a comparatively decentralised and mobile force structure, substantial experience of irregular operations, and networks developed through previous conflicts and deployments. These differences affected the way each organisation could operate, but neither automatically guaranteed strategic superiority. Conventional military assets require secure installations, maintenance, personnel and reliable communications; mobile armed formations require fuel, ammunition, recruits, local access and functioning supply relationships.

The fighting that began in Khartoum and Merowe on 15 April 2023 quickly expanded into Darfur and other areas. The war simultaneously threatened the national political centre and regions already affected by longstanding conflict, displacement and communal violence. Rather than establishing a single geographically continuous front line, the early conflict created several operational environments in which control could vary between urban districts, transport routes, military facilities and regional population centres. This distinction between control of territory and control of movement would become increasingly consequential as the war developed.

The rapid deterioration of security in Darfur was particularly important. According to the United Nations Panel of Experts’ reporting on the sanctions regime, the RSF had consolidated its control over much of the region by late 2023, while the military and political importance of El Fasher increased because it remained under SAF and allied armed movements. The region’s conflict therefore developed its own operational logic: the RSF sought to expand and consolidate control, while SAF-aligned forces attempted to preserve strategically important positions and prevent the complete displacement of the army’s regional presence. Final Report of the Panel of Experts on the Sudan, S/2025/239 — United Nations Security Council — 2025.

This geographical divergence fundamentally changed the strategic problem confronting both belligerents. The army could not determine the outcome of the conflict by concentrating exclusively on the institutions of central Sudan, because the western regions contained armed formations and territorial interests capable of sustaining a separate campaign. The RSF, meanwhile, could not establish uncontested nationwide governmental authority merely by accumulating territorial gains in Darfur while SAF-controlled administrative and military structures survived elsewhere.

Consequently, Sudan was moving towards a system of geographically differentiated military power, in which each belligerent had to manage distinct territorial environments, allied organisations and population relationships. The war’s duration became increasingly dependent upon the ability of these competing systems to sustain operations despite the absence of decisive nationwide victory.

The role of regional armed movements further complicated this balance. The Joint Forces defending El Fasher included organisations associated with the Juba Peace Agreement, notably the Sudan Liberation Movement led by Minni Minawi and the Justice and Equality Movement. Their participation illustrated that Sudan’s conflict was not reducible to two perfectly unified military organisations. Existing regional movements retained their own historical leadership, constituencies and political objectives, even when operating alongside the SAF. This arrangement could provide additional military manpower and local knowledge, but it also complicated command coordination and the eventual negotiation of comprehensive security arrangements.

A second consequence concerned the growing strategic importance of corridors rather than individual cities. An armed organisation might hold an administrative centre but remain unable to maintain uninterrupted access to neighbouring regions. Conversely, forces controlling roads, peripheral settlements or logistical approaches could exert considerable pressure on a city without occupying its central institutions. These relationships became especially significant in the campaigns around El Fasher and later in Kordofan, where control of routes affected military resupply, population movement and access to essential services.

Table 2 — Comparison of the Principal Military Organisations at the Structural Level

Analytical dimension	Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF)	Rapid Support Forces (RSF)	Strategic implication
Institutional origin	Established national military institution	Paramilitary formation that developed from structures associated with Darfur’s earlier conflicts	Different histories of command, organisation and political legitimacy
Principal leadership	General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan	Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo	Highly centralised strategic leadership does not imply equally centralised field-level control
Conventional military structure	Established army formations and conventional military capabilities	Mobile formations supported by allied armed elements	Different operational advantages across urban, rural and geographically dispersed battlefields
Political authority	Continued association with Sudan’s established state institutions	Competing territorial and political structures in RSF-controlled areas	Control of institutions and control of territory are not equivalent forms of authority
Alliance relationships	Cooperation with SAF-aligned regional armed movements	Cooperation with allied militias and other armed networks	Coalition management influences military cohesion and political bargaining
Operational dependence	Sustained military logistics, personnel, infrastructure and maintenance	Sustained mobility, recruitment, materiel supply and territorial access	Both require durable support systems despite their differing organisational models
Main governance vulnerability	Restoring civilian legitimacy and nationwide authority beyond military recapture	Establishing legitimate, accountable administration in territories under its control	Neither can resolve the state crisis through coercive territorial control alone

The comparison concerns organisational characteristics, not verified force strengths or a numerical measurement of combat effectiveness. Quantitative force comparisons would require compatible, independently verified data on active personnel, operational equipment, logistics and readiness that cannot reliably be inferred from nominal inventories or competing wartime claims.

The Second Military Transformation, 2025: The Recovery of Khartoum and the Consolidation of the Darfur Front

The military developments of 2025 marked an important shift in the distribution of territorial power, but they also exposed the limitations of interpreting Sudan’s conflict through the control of individual cities. The SAF’s recapture of Khartoum in March 2025 constituted a major operational and political achievement because the capital represented the historic centre of national government, military command, public administration and international diplomatic activity. Re-establishing control over this territory created opportunities to restore state institutions and reconnect parts of central Sudan to the army’s administrative network. However, the recapture of a capital is not equivalent to the restoration of a functioning national state, particularly where other regions remain under competing armed authorities and the security institutions responsible for protecting recovered territory have themselves been weakened by prolonged fighting.

The strategic importance of the Khartoum campaign rested on three distinct effects: the recovery of a major military and administrative centre, the reduction of the RSF’s direct territorial presence in the capital, and the reinforcement of the SAF’s claim to represent the continuing institutions of the Sudanese state. These effects were substantial but did not resolve the wider conflict. The army still faced major opposition in western Sudan, while competing armed forces retained the ability to contest important operational corridors and population centres. A successful campaign in the capital therefore improved the SAF’s position without removing the territorial and political foundations of the RSF’s continued resistance.

The process of recovering Khartoum also revealed the challenges of re-establishing effective authority after prolonged occupation and urban warfare. When armed forces regain territory, the immediate operational requirements include clearing remaining military positions, maintaining discipline among allied formations, restoring public order, protecting civilians and re-establishing administrative services. These requirements differ from those of the offensive itself. They demand policing, judicial capacity, functioning civil institutions and accountable relationships between military personnel and the population. Without them, a territorial advance may introduce new forms of insecurity even after the opposing force has withdrawn.

The United Nations documented serious violations during the recapture of territory in Khartoum. In its September 2025 assessment covering the first half of that year, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights recorded at least 990 unlawful civilian killings outside the conduct of hostilities, including summary executions. The report identified a major increase in such killings between February and April 2025, associated in part with apparent reprisals against individuals accused of collaboration with opposing forces. The same report also documented summary executions by the RSF as SAF and allied formations advanced towards their positions. Sudan Crisis Deepens Amid Rising Civilian Casualties, Growing Ethnic Violence and Grim Humanitarian Situation — United Nations Human Rights Office — September 2025.

These findings have an important institutional implication. The capacity to regain territory and the capacity to exercise lawful, accountable authority are related but separate measures of state recovery. A military victory establishes control over a location; political stabilisation requires the protection of its inhabitants, the prevention of retaliation, the restoration of predictable legal institutions and the ability to administer the territory without recurrent coercive violence. The documented reprisals demonstrate why military recapture cannot automatically be treated as evidence of a successful transition from warfare to civilian security.

At the opposite end of Sudan’s military geography, the campaign in Darfur moved towards a different outcome. El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, had remained under SAF and allied forces despite the RSF’s expansion elsewhere in the region. Its importance was not limited to its administrative status. It represented a surviving centre of military resistance, a connection between the SAF and regional armed movements, and a focal point for control over the surrounding territories. The city’s position became increasingly precarious as the RSF and allied forces imposed a prolonged siege and sought to restrict movement into and out of the area.

The United Nations investigation published in February 2026 established that the RSF and allied Arab militias had maintained an effective siege of El Fasher from May 2024, using ground operations, artillery bombardment and drones while restricting the movement of essential supplies. The siege progressively transformed the military contest into a struggle over access, endurance and the ability of the defending forces and civilian population to survive prolonged isolation. Human Rights Violations and Abuses During the RSF Offensive and Capture of El Fasher — United Nations Human Rights Office — February 2026.

The final offensive began on 24 October 2025. According to the United Nations Human Rights Office, the subsequent violence included mass killings, summary executions, sexual violence, abductions, torture and attacks against civilians attempting to flee. Investigators documented more than 6,000 killings during the first three days of the offensive, including at least 4,400 within El Fasher and more than 1,600 along routes used by fleeing civilians. These figures represent the documented minimum established through the investigation rather than a comprehensive final death toll. The report concluded that acts committed during the offensive amounted to war crimes and could constitute crimes against humanity. RSF Violations During Capture of El Fasher Amount to War Crimes and Possible Crimes Against Humanity — United Nations Human Rights Office — February 2026.

The military consequences of El Fasher’s fall were inseparable from the political implications of the violence accompanying it. The loss of the city removed a major SAF-aligned position in North Darfur and weakened the territorial continuity of the anti-RSF coalition within the region. At the same time, the documented atrocities created deeper obstacles to future governance, reconciliation and the formation of a legitimate political administration. Communities subjected to mass violence and persecution are unlikely to regard control by the responsible armed organisation as a sufficient basis for political legitimacy. As a consequence, consolidation of military authority can coexist with profound insecurity, population flight and continuing social resistance.

The central contradiction of 2025 was therefore that both belligerents achieved geographically important military gains without establishing the conditions necessary for a stable national political order. The SAF recovered a major institutional centre but did not regain nationwide control. The RSF consolidated important positions in Darfur but did so within a context of severe documented violations that undermined the possibility of legitimate and inclusive governance. The opposing territorial developments reinforced the fragmentation of Sudan rather than resolving the original dispute over state authority.

Table 3 — The Major Military and Territorial Turning Points of 2023–2026

Period	Documented development	Immediate military significance	Longer-term institutional consequence
April 2023	Armed confrontation begins in Khartoum and Merowe and spreads to Darfur	Breakdown of cooperation between the principal armed organisations	National military authority becomes openly contested
Late 2023	RSF consolidates control over four of Darfur’s five states	Western territorial balance shifts substantially towards RSF	Regional control becomes increasingly distinct from central governmental authority
May 2024 onward	RSF and allied formations maintain a sustained siege of El Fasher	Restriction of military access, movement and resupply	Siege conditions weaken both civilian survival and the defenders’ ability to maintain a functioning urban environment
March 2025	SAF and allied forces recover major territory in Khartoum	Major restoration of the army’s territorial position in the capital	Opportunity for administrative recovery accompanied by serious security and accountability challenges
April 2025	Major RSF attacks affect North Darfur, including camps for displaced people	Pressure intensifies on population centres and positions associated with the defence of El Fasher	Displacement and attacks against civilians further erode conditions for stable territorial administration
October 2025	RSF captures El Fasher following prolonged siege	Elimination of a major SAF-aligned stronghold in North Darfur	Western territorial fragmentation becomes more pronounced; mass atrocities create deeper obstacles to political reconciliation
August–October 2026	Renewed hostilities in Kordofan and Blue Nile, with continued pressure on major routes and urban centres	Active conflict shifts across strategically important central and eastern approaches	The recovery of selected cities does not produce a stable nationwide security system

The principal official references are the United Nations Human Rights Office Assessment of Sudan, January–June 2025 — September 2025, the United Nations Investigation into the Capture of El Fasher — February 2026, and the UNFPA Sudan Situation Report for August 2026 — October 2026.

The table demonstrates that the principal military campaigns have progressively changed the location of strategic pressure without producing a unified national command structure. This is not merely a chronological observation. It establishes an analytical distinction between territorial redistribution, which can occur through military operations, and state reconstruction, which requires institutions capable of governing territory over time.

Kordofan and Blue Nile in 2026: The Emergence of a Strategic Contest over Territorial Connectivity

By 2026, the military significance of Kordofan and Blue Nile had increased because their geography connects different political and operational environments within Sudan. Kordofan lies between important central territories and Darfur, while Blue Nile occupies a strategic position near Sudan’s eastern approaches and its frontier with Ethiopia. Developments in these regions therefore affect more than local military balances. They influence whether competing armed organisations can maintain access between territorial strongholds, contest major urban centres and exert pressure on the wider network of roads and settlements through which national administration and military logistics must function.

Kordofan’s importance is particularly pronounced because it occupies a transitional geographical position between areas in which the SAF has maintained substantial institutional control and the RSF’s western areas of influence. This gives the region significance for both defensive and offensive operations. For the SAF, maintaining access through Kordofan supports territorial connectivity and the defence of important cities. For the RSF, sustained pressure in the region can complicate the army’s consolidation of central Sudan and prevent the conflict from becoming geographically confined to Darfur.

The principal analytical question is consequently not only whether one side can capture a particular town, but whether it can preserve secure movement through the surrounding region. A transport corridor can remain nominally open yet be operationally unreliable because of intermittent attacks, road insecurity, damaged infrastructure or the presence of hostile forces near its approaches. Such circumstances can make military resupply unpredictable and complicate the movement of civilian goods even where permanent occupation of the corridor has not occurred.

The conflict around El Obeid, the capital of North Kordofan, illustrates the importance of this distinction. The city has become a major focal point of military pressure because of its administrative role and its location within the wider territorial network linking central Sudan with western regions. Renewed attacks and insecurity around the city demonstrate the continuing vulnerability of strategically important population centres despite the army’s earlier successes elsewhere.

The decisive feature of Kordofan’s military geography is the relationship between urban strongholds and the corridors needed to sustain them. A force holding a city must preserve sufficient access to maintain its military formations, replenish essential supplies, support public administration and permit civilian economic activity. An adversary may undermine these objectives without capturing the entire city, particularly where recurring attacks or pressure on surrounding approaches create persistent uncertainty.

The situation in Blue Nile presents a different but related challenge. In its report published on 4 October 2026, the United Nations Population Fund recorded that renewed clashes in Blue Nile State had displaced approximately 21,000 people during August 2026. The report also described continued hostilities and insecurity across Greater Kordofan, where flooding and deteriorating conditions further restricted essential services. Situation Report on the Crisis in Sudan, August 2026 — United Nations Population Fund — October 2026.

The displacement in Blue Nile is significant because it shows that insecurity has continued to affect a region whose location creates strategic exposure along Sudan’s eastern frontier. It does not, by itself, establish the presence of foreign forces or prove the existence of a cross-border command structure. Those propositions require separate verification. Nevertheless, the movement of civilians and the persistence of fighting demonstrate that military pressure remains geographically distributed rather than concentrated exclusively in the western conflict zone.

The consequence for national military planning is a problem of competing operational priorities. Maintaining security in central Sudan, preventing further deterioration in Kordofan, protecting eastern approaches and supporting continuing operations in contested regions all require resources. The ability to prioritise one area may therefore be constrained by developments elsewhere. This creates opportunities for an adversary to impose additional burdens by sustaining pressure across multiple locations.

Such a strategy does not necessarily require simultaneous large-scale ground offensives. Repeated attacks, threats to movement and localised engagements can compel defending forces to allocate personnel, transport, surveillance and defensive capabilities to several geographically separated tasks. The operational value of these actions depends on their effects rather than their visibility. An attack that does not change a territorial boundary can nevertheless alter the allocation of scarce military resources and reduce the capacity to conduct operations elsewhere.

Table 4 — Strategic Geography and the Changing Functions of Key Sudanese Regions

Region	Principal geographical function	Documented military development	Strategic importance for SAF	Strategic importance for RSF	Main institutional consequence
Khartoum and surrounding capital area	National governmental and administrative centre	SAF recovery of major territory in March 2025	Restoration of an important institutional and command centre	Loss of a major former urban position	Administrative recovery becomes possible but requires civilian governance and public security
North Darfur	Western military and political centre	RSF capture of El Fasher in October 2025	Loss of a major regional stronghold and allied defensive position	Consolidation of territorial influence in Darfur	Severe fragmentation and deepened legitimacy crisis following documented atrocities
South Darfur	Important western territorial and organisational base	Continued RSF presence within its western areas of control	Challenge to recovering nationwide territorial authority	Support for sustained regional operations	Reinforcement of competing regional authority structures
North Kordofan	Connection between central Sudan and western territories	Continued fighting and pressure on El Obeid and regional routes	Protection of territorial connectivity and major urban positions	Ability to contest the army’s central-western access	Corridor security becomes central to the viability of local administration
Greater Kordofan	Wider central-western operating environment	Renewed hostilities and displacement during 2026	Requirement to sustain multiple regional commitments	Opportunity to maintain pressure beyond Darfur	Increased uncertainty over territorial continuity
Blue Nile	Eastern frontier and access to neighbouring territory	Renewed fighting and approximately 21,000 displaced in August 2026	Protection of eastern territorial approaches	Potential significance of continued military pressure outside western strongholds	Eastern insecurity adds pressure to the wider national security system
Eastern and Red Sea-connected areas	International connectivity, trade and logistical access	Continued strategic relevance to the functioning of central state institutions	Preservation of external connectivity and administrative continuity	Ability to impose pressure beyond immediate ground-held areas	International connectivity remains an important component of national resilience

The regional comparison is grounded in the UN Human Rights Investigation of El Fasher — February 2026, the UN Human Rights Report on the January–June 2025 Conflict — September 2025, and the UNFPA August 2026 Sudan Situation Report — October 2026. The geographical functions and strategic consequences are analytical interpretations of the documented developments, not claims of independently verified troop dispositions.

This regional differentiation provides a more useful foundation for evaluating Sudan’s military balance than a national map divided into two colours. Such a map would imply a level of territorial permanence and uniformity that the available evidence does not establish. The reality is more complex: administrative control, military deployment, access to routes, civilian security and the ability to maintain essential institutions can differ considerably within the same nominally controlled region.

The Political Transformation of Territorial Control: Parallel Institutions, Competing Legitimacy and the Risk of De Facto Partition

The geographical fragmentation of military power has been accompanied by an increasingly consequential political development: the attempt to convert territorial control into a separate governing authority. This process represents an escalation beyond the ordinary establishment of military administrations during civil war. It concerns the creation of institutions that may claim powers traditionally exercised by the sovereign state, including the regulation of civilian affairs, representation of populations, administrative appointments and the exercise of public authority. Where such structures become entrenched, the restoration of national unity becomes more difficult even if fighting subsequently diminishes, because competing organisations may acquire political and economic interests in preserving their separate jurisdictions.

On 24 February 2025, the United Nations Secretary-General expressed concern over a political charter announced by the RSF and associated civilian and armed groups, intended to establish a governing authority in territories under RSF control. The Secretary-General warned that the initiative threatened to deepen Sudan’s fragmentation and further entrench the conflict. The Security Council subsequently expressed concern that the establishment of a parallel governing authority could undermine Sudanese sovereignty, aggravate the humanitarian situation and destabilise the wider region. Statement on the Establishment of a Governing Authority in RSF-Controlled Areas — United Nations Secretary-General — February 2025; Security Council Press Statement on Sudan — United Nations Security Council — March 2025.

The RSF-associated political project subsequently developed into a parallel administrative structure, further complicating efforts to preserve a unified national political framework. The United Nations’ Sudan Interim Cooperation Framework for 2026–2028 describes the existence of a Port Sudan-based government and a parallel RSF-led administration not recognised by the international community. The framework places this development within the broader difficulties confronting the political settlement and the restoration of inclusive national governance. Sudan Interim Cooperation Framework 2026–2028 — United Nations Sustainable Development Group — October 2025.

The distinction between a parallel administration and a recognised sovereign government is legally and politically essential. An armed organisation can exercise factual control over territory and regulate the daily lives of its inhabitants without thereby acquiring international recognition as the legitimate government of the state. Conversely, international recognition of existing national institutions does not automatically establish their effective administrative control over every region. Sudan’s fragmentation therefore involves three different dimensions of authority: international legal recognition, effective territorial control and the capacity to provide legitimate civilian governance. Treating these dimensions as interchangeable would produce misleading assessments of both the military balance and the prospects for political settlement.

The African Union has maintained a clear position against the establishment of a parallel RSF government. In its communiqué concerning the atrocities in El Fasher, adopted following the emergency meeting of 28 October 2025, the African Union Peace and Security Council rejected the parallel governing structure, reaffirmed its opposition to external interference and called for an inclusive Sudanese political process. It also requested further attention to external actors providing military, financial or political support to the belligerents. Communiqué of the 1308th Emergency Meeting on Sudan and El Fasher — African Union Peace and Security Council — October 2025.

This institutional position matters because the African Union’s opposition to partition cannot be reduced to a diplomatic preference for existing borders. It reflects the wider concern that Sudan’s fragmentation could create an enduring precedent for armed organisations to transform military occupation into competing national political structures. The resulting instability could affect neighbouring states, regional organisations and future attempts to negotiate an internationally supported settlement. However, opposition to a parallel government does not eliminate the practical challenge of administering populations who currently live outside the effective control of established national institutions.

The possible consequences become clearer when the practical functions of government are considered. National administration requires coherent rules governing identity documents, educational qualifications, taxation, commercial transactions, public employment, property registration and access to essential public services. If separate administrations begin exercising these functions according to incompatible procedures, ordinary civilian activities may acquire a political dimension. A family moving between territories may encounter different administrative requirements. Businesses operating across regional boundaries may face competing demands from authorities. Property disputes may become difficult to adjudicate where courts, registries or enforcement institutions are no longer recognised across the country.

Such fragmentation can become self-reinforcing. As separate governing structures develop, the costs of returning to a unified system may increase because officials, security commanders, commercial intermediaries and local political elites acquire interests connected to their continued existence. This creates a potential transition from temporary wartime administration to institutionalised territorial separation, even without a formal declaration of independence or internationally recognised partition.

Table 5 — The Three Dimensions of Authority in Sudan’s Fragmented Political Order

Dimension	Meaning	Principal question	Consequence for national stabilisation
International legal recognition	Recognition of institutions as representing the Sudanese state	Which authorities are accepted in interstate diplomatic and legal relations?	Determines important aspects of external representation, agreements and international cooperation
Effective territorial control	Practical capacity to exercise power within a geographical area	Which organisation can enforce decisions, maintain positions and regulate movement?	Determines where national policies can be implemented in practice
Civilian administrative capacity	Ability to provide services, maintain records, administer justice and manage public institutions	Can the authority govern civilians through functioning institutions rather than military coercion?	Determines whether territorial control can evolve into stable governance
Political legitimacy	Degree to which authority is accepted as lawful and representative	Do affected populations have credible avenues for participation, accountability and protection?	Influences the sustainability of any political settlement
Coercive command authority	Ability to direct and discipline armed formations	Can commanders issue and enforce orders across subordinate and allied units?	Determines whether security guarantees and ceasefire obligations can be implemented
Institutional continuity	Preservation of records, personnel, financing and administrative procedures	Can state functions continue through political or military transitions?	Influences reconstruction costs and the feasibility of reunifying administrative systems

These dimensions should not be combined into a single numerical sovereignty indicator. They are legally and operationally distinct, and their relative importance varies according to the decision under examination.

The Changing Meaning of Military Superiority: Why Territorial Control No Longer Establishes Decisive Advantage

Sudan’s military developments demonstrate the inadequacy of relying on conventional indicators such as the number of captured cities, the declared size of armed formations or possession of major installations. These indicators may describe important elements of the conflict, but none is sufficient to establish a decisive military advantage. Military power must be evaluated through the relationship between force generation, operational sustainability, territorial access, political cohesion and the ability to translate military operations into durable strategic outcomes.

Force generation concerns the ability to maintain an adequate flow of personnel, training and military equipment. Operational sustainability concerns the capacity to continue military activity over time despite losses, logistical interruption and competing demands. Territorial access concerns whether forces can move between operational areas and sustain their positions. Political cohesion concerns the degree to which allied formations share common objectives and respond to effective leadership. Strategic conversion concerns whether tactical gains can produce lasting political, administrative or economic results.

These dimensions are especially important in Sudan because the two principal organisations possess different institutional characteristics, while their actual operational capabilities vary across geographical areas and periods. The fact that a force can capture a city does not establish its capacity to retain control indefinitely. Likewise, the ability to conduct attacks across a large geographical area does not necessarily demonstrate the capacity to occupy that area or establish a functioning administration.

The problem becomes more acute when allied armed movements are involved. A military coalition may achieve operational advantages by combining organisations with complementary territorial knowledge, recruitment networks or fighting capabilities. Yet the same coalition can encounter political difficulties if its constituent groups retain separate commanders, territorial interests or expectations regarding the distribution of future authority.

This creates a distinction between coalition military effectiveness and coalition political durability. Armed organisations may cooperate effectively against a common adversary while disagreeing over the future structure of government, resource distribution or security-sector integration. An assessment that assumes wartime military cooperation will automatically survive into post-war government formation would neglect one of the underlying problems that contributed to Sudan’s institutional crisis.

The available evidence also requires caution in interpreting claims about military readiness. A nominal inventory does not establish operational availability. A weapons delivery does not demonstrate sustained battlefield effectiveness. A public declaration of control does not establish the absence of resistance. Similarly, reports of an attack do not automatically identify every participant, weapon system or command relationship responsible for the operation.

Accordingly, a rigorous analysis of the evolving balance of power must distinguish documented operational outcomes from statements issued by the belligerents and from assessments of future capability. These distinctions become particularly significant when evaluating remotely operated weapons, air defence and the economic costs of sustaining long-range military operations, which are examined separately in Chapter 2.

The Human Consequences of Military Fragmentation and Their Effect on Political Reconstruction

The civilian consequences of Sudan’s military transformation are not limited to the immediate destruction associated with armed combat. They also affect the relationship between communities and the authorities exercising power over them. Prolonged insecurity can displace civilian officials, destroy administrative records, interrupt education, reduce access to courts and weaken the networks through which local communities manage disputes and economic activity. The resulting institutional damage can persist long after the cessation of major military operations.

The seriousness of these consequences is demonstrated by the United Nations Human Rights Office’s findings for the first half of 2025. Between 1 January and 30 June, it documented at least 3,384 civilian deaths connected to the conflict, compared with 4,238 documented during the entirety of 2024. The first-half 2025 total was thus equivalent to approximately 79.8% of the full-year 2024 documented figure, although the different reporting periods prevent treating that comparison as a complete annual trend. The UN attributed 2,398 of the first-half 2025 deaths to the conduct of hostilities and documented extensive additional violence, including unlawful killings outside active combat. Sudan Crisis Deepens Amid Rising Civilian Casualties, Growing Ethnic Violence and Grim Humanitarian Situation — United Nations Human Rights Office — September 2025.

These figures reveal a political as well as a humanitarian problem. The protection of civilian populations is essential to the restoration of legitimate national authority. When territorial change is accompanied by reprisals, ethnic discrimination or widespread violations of international humanitarian law, communities may come to regard transitions in military control as additional sources of insecurity rather than steps towards stabilisation. This undermines confidence in governing institutions and can discourage voluntary return even where the immediate battlefront has moved elsewhere.

The violence in El Fasher provides an especially severe illustration of this relationship. The United Nations documented killings and other abuses directed against civilians, including attacks associated with ethnic identity or perceived political affiliation. Such conduct generates obstacles to reconciliation that cannot be resolved through military arrangements alone. The restoration of civilian governance requires credible protection guarantees, accountability mechanisms and institutions capable of addressing the grievances created by violence.

A durable settlement must therefore be evaluated against its ability to establish not only military separation or cessation of hostilities, but also the conditions required for people to participate safely in economic and civic life.

Table 6 — Verified Civilian Protection Indicators and Their Institutional Significance

Indicator	Documented figure	Reference period	Institutional significance
Civilian deaths documented during 2024	4,238	Full year 2024	Baseline for assessing the documented scale of violence
Civilian deaths documented in first half of 2025	At least 3,384	January–June 2025	Demonstrates severe violence during major territorial campaigns
Civilian deaths occurring during hostilities	2,398	January–June 2025	Indicates the direct civilian consequences of combat operations
Unlawful civilian killings outside hostilities	At least 990	January–June 2025	Highlights failures of protection and accountability outside immediate battlefield engagements
Civilian deaths documented in April 2025 attacks around El Fasher and North Darfur	At least 527	April 2025	Demonstrates the consequences of intensified regional military operations
Civilians killed in the Tora market airstrikes attributed to SAF	At least 350	March 2025	Demonstrates civilian risk associated with aerial attacks
Killings documented during the opening three days of the final El Fasher offensive	More than 6,000	October 2025	Establishes the scale of atrocities associated with the city’s capture
Civilians newly displaced by fighting in Blue Nile	Approximately 21,000	August 2026	Shows continued population insecurity outside the principal western strongholds

Sources: Human Rights Situation in Sudan, January–June 2025 — United Nations Human Rights Office — September 2025; Investigation into the RSF Capture of El Fasher — United Nations Human Rights Office — February 2026; Sudan Situation Report, August 2026 — United Nations Population Fund — October 2026.

The figures in this table concern different reporting periods, methodologies and incident categories. They are not additive. In particular, the deaths documented during individual operations may form part of broader reporting totals, while the October 2025 El Fasher findings belong to a different reporting period from the January–June 2025 data.

The Strategic Importance of Command, Logistics and Administrative Continuity

A comprehensive interpretation of Sudan’s military transformation requires attention to the institutional mechanisms that allow armed organisations to continue operating despite territorial losses. Conventional discussions of civil war often place excessive emphasis on battles and territorial boundaries, while insufficiently examining the systems that reproduce military capability.

The endurance of an armed organisation depends on its capacity to replace personnel, replenish equipment, maintain command relationships, secure revenue and preserve sufficient organisational cohesion to operate over time. These functions may be performed through different arrangements, including military institutions, allied groups, local networks or external commercial relationships. Their relative contribution varies between organisations and across stages of the conflict.

In Sudan, this distinction has major implications because neither principal belligerent has achieved a decisive nationwide victory despite successive territorial reversals and advances. The persistence of military operations after major losses suggests that territorial defeat in one area does not necessarily eliminate the organisational capacity required to continue fighting elsewhere.

The critical analytical variable is therefore not merely the amount of territory controlled at a given moment, but the relationship between operational losses and the capacity for organisational regeneration. A force that loses an urban position but retains access to personnel, equipment and territorial support may remain capable of conducting further operations. Conversely, a force that acquires additional territory but cannot sustain its logistics or discipline its allied formations may find its apparent gains difficult to consolidate.

This relationship also affects the feasibility of ceasefire arrangements. Effective cessation of hostilities requires identifiable chains of command and mechanisms capable of transmitting and enforcing orders. Where armed coalitions operate through overlapping authorities, a formal commitment by senior leaders may not be sufficient to guarantee compliance by every associated formation. The design of monitoring and accountability measures must therefore reflect the actual distribution of command responsibility rather than assuming that all fighters operate through a single centralised structure.

Table 7 — Indicators Required to Assess Military Power Beyond Territorial Gains

Dimension of military power	Evidence necessary for assessment	Why it matters	Principal limitation
Personnel sustainability	Verified recruitment, training, losses and active personnel	Determines whether forces can maintain operations over time	Wartime personnel figures are often inconsistent or incomplete
Command cohesion	Demonstrable control over subordinate and allied formations	Determines whether strategic decisions can be enforced operationally	Formal hierarchy may not reflect actual field-level control
Logistical continuity	Verified access to supplies, maintenance and transport	Determines the durability of military operations	Nominal access does not establish uninterrupted delivery
Territorial connectivity	Verified security of routes and access between controlled locations	Determines whether positions can be sustained	Territorial maps may conceal contested movement corridors
Operational readiness	Evidence of functioning equipment, trained operators and available support	Distinguishes actual capability from nominal inventory	Equipment possession does not establish readiness
Financial sustainability	Documented and appropriately attributed revenue and procurement arrangements	Determines the capacity to regenerate military resources	Financial flows may be opaque or distributed across jurisdictions
Political coalition cohesion	Formal agreements, demonstrated cooperation and evidence of internal disputes	Determines the durability of wartime alliances	Common opposition to an adversary does not guarantee common political objectives
Administrative consolidation	Functioning public institutions, lawful security provision and service continuity	Indicates whether military gains can produce stable governance	Occupation of public buildings does not establish effective civilian administration

The absence of compatible, independently verified numerical data in several categories prevents a defensible composite military-power ranking. Such a ranking would create artificial precision and could obscure the difference between demonstrated capability and assumed capability.

The Implications for Sudan’s Future Political Settlement

Sudan’s experience between 2019 and 2026 establishes that its central political challenge is not simply the replacement of wartime military confrontation with an agreement between senior commanders. The deeper requirement is the construction of a viable institutional relationship between civilian political authority, national armed forces, regional movements and the communities affected by prolonged conflict.

The original transition encountered difficulties because it attempted to establish civilian political institutions while leaving crucial questions of military authority unresolved. The subsequent war has made those questions substantially more complex by creating new territorial divisions, strengthening the importance of local armed networks and generating competing administrative structures. Any settlement must therefore address institutional problems that existed before April 2023 alongside those produced by the war itself.

A sustainable political framework would need to establish a credible sequence linking cessation of hostilities, civilian protection, command accountability, the restructuring of armed organisations and the restoration of nationwide public institutions. The sequence matters because premature institutional unification without enforceable security guarantees could create renewed confrontation, while indefinite postponement of security-sector reform could preserve the military autonomy responsible for the earlier collapse.

The participation of civilian political forces is equally important. A settlement negotiated exclusively among military organisations might reduce immediate armed competition but leave unresolved the legitimacy of future government, the protection of political freedoms and the relationship between central institutions and historically marginalised regions. This risk is particularly significant in areas where communities have experienced repeated displacement, ethnic violence and exclusion from political decision-making.

The United Nations and African Union have consistently emphasised an inclusive Sudanese political process, the preservation of national territorial integrity and the protection of civilians. These objectives are complementary, but they require concrete institutional arrangements rather than declarations alone. African Union Peace and Security Council Communiqué on Sudan — October 2025; United Nations Interim Cooperation Framework for Sudan 2026–2028 — October 2025.

The ultimate test of political reconstruction will be whether institutions can exercise authority across Sudan without depending upon the continuing autonomy of rival armed organisations. Until that condition is achieved, periods of reduced violence may remain vulnerable to renewed competition over command, territory and political representation.

Key Judgments

Sudan’s military transformation is inseparable from the failure of its political transition. The institutions established after 2019 were unable to resolve the distribution of coercive power among competing armed organisations. The armed confrontation beginning in April 2023 converted this unresolved institutional question into a nationwide territorial conflict.

The major military developments of 2025 redistributed territorial power without resolving the struggle for sovereignty. The SAF’s recovery of Khartoum reinforced its institutional position, while the RSF’s capture of El Fasher consolidated a major western military position. The strategic result was not national reunification but a more pronounced geographical separation between competing centres of armed power.

Kordofan and Blue Nile demonstrate that the conflict remains geographically dynamic. Military pressure in these regions affects connections between territorial strongholds, the protection of important population centres and the distribution of military resources. Control of major cities must consequently be assessed together with the security of their surrounding routes and the ability to maintain functioning administration.

The emergence of parallel political structures increases the risk that temporary wartime fragmentation will develop into enduring institutional separation. International recognition, territorial control and legitimate civilian governance remain distinct, and the establishment of administrative structures under armed authority does not resolve the question of Sudan’s nationally recognised government.

The capacity to regenerate military power is becoming more important than individual territorial victories. Organisational cohesion, logistics, personnel, financing and political alliances determine whether losses translate into strategic defeat or whether armed formations remain capable of sustaining the conflict.

Civilian protection and accountability are indispensable components of military stabilisation. The documented violations associated with territorial campaigns illustrate why recapturing or occupying population centres cannot, by itself, establish the conditions necessary for durable governance.

What Would Change the Assessment

The present judgment would require substantial revision if independently verified developments demonstrated that one national authority had achieved durable territorial connectivity, established functioning civilian institutions across previously contested areas and obtained enforceable command arrangements covering the principal armed formations. A stable and monitored political agreement, accompanied by a sustained reduction in attacks, the restoration of civilian administration and the credible integration or demobilisation of armed organisations, would provide stronger evidence that Sudan was moving away from institutional fragmentation.

Conversely, the expansion of competing administrative institutions, further territorial consolidation by separate armed authorities, additional breakdowns in military coalition cohesion or repeated failures to maintain essential services in recovered population centres would reinforce the assessment that the conflict is developing into a prolonged system of divided authority.

The most important unresolved official records concern the actual scope of command exercised over allied armed formations, the functioning of administrative institutions in territories outside central government control, the verification of access to critical operational corridors and the enforceability of any future arrangements for integrating armed organisations into a national security structure.

The defining conclusion of Chapter 1 is that Sudan’s crisis cannot be resolved through territorial military success alone. The country faces the more difficult task of reconstructing a national political and security order after the fragmentation of the institutions that once claimed authority over its armed forces, administrative centres and regional territories. The next stage of analysis must therefore examine how evolving military technologies change the cost, reach and sustainability of operations within this fragmented environment.

OPEN-SOURCE ANALYTICAL ASSESSMENT | 15 OCTOBER 2026

PILLAR I — THE TRANSFORMATION OF SUDAN’S MILITARY AND POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY

Chapter 2. Unmanned Warfare, Air Defence and the New Economics of Military Reach

The Emergence of a New Operational Paradigm: Military Reach Without Continuous Territorial Control

The expansion of unmanned aerial warfare in Sudan represents a structural change in the relationship between military capability, operational geography and the economic resources required to sustain armed conflict. Its significance extends beyond the introduction of additional weapons systems into an already fragmented battlefield. Unmanned aircraft have altered the conditions under which armed organisations can threaten distant locations, contest logistical infrastructure, impose defensive burdens and maintain military pressure without exercising continuous ground control over the territory affected. The result is an operational environment in which the geographical separation between opposing forces no longer provides the degree of protection traditionally associated with distance from the front line.

The central transformation concerns the distinction between territorial presence and the capacity to generate military effects. Conventional ground forces must generally move through or around geographical obstacles, maintain supply routes and secure access to operational areas. Unmanned aerial systems can, under suitable technical and operational conditions, extend surveillance and strike capacity beyond the immediate deployment area of their operators. They do not eliminate the importance of geography, logistics or military infrastructure, but they change the way these constraints interact. An armed formation may threaten a distant installation without possessing the personnel or resources necessary to occupy the surrounding territory, while the defending force must consider the vulnerability of locations that previously required comparatively limited protection.

The United Nations identified this transformation in unusually explicit terms on 11 May 2026, when High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned that the escalating use of armed unmanned aerial vehicles had become a leading cause of documented civilian deaths and was allowing hostilities to continue during the rainy season, a period that had previously constrained some ground operations. Between January and April 2026, the UN Human Rights Office recorded at least 880 civilian deaths attributed to drone strikes, representing more than 80% of the conflict-related civilian deaths documented by that office during the period. The High Commissioner also warned that the geographical expansion of drone attacks was exposing central and eastern Sudan to growing danger. Türk Issues High Alert on Widening Sudan Conflict amid Increased Use of Drones — United Nations Human Rights Office — May 2026.

This finding has an operational implication that goes beyond the casualty statistics. The increasing ability to conduct military operations independently of ground mobility can reduce the seasonal interruption that previously affected certain forms of warfare. Rainfall, deteriorating road conditions and the reduced accessibility of rural terrain may constrain vehicles, supply convoys and ground formations more severely than some categories of aircraft. The actual performance of unmanned systems remains sensitive to weather, visibility, launch conditions, maintenance and communications, and it would be incorrect to claim that drones are unaffected by seasonal conditions. Nevertheless, the UN’s assessment establishes that the wider adoption of armed drones has altered the historical relationship between Sudan’s rainy season and the intensity of hostilities.

The operational consequence is particularly serious for civilian populations. Seasonal reductions in major ground operations can provide temporary opportunities for movement, humanitarian delivery, agricultural work and the restoration of basic services. Where aerial attacks continue despite reduced ground mobility, these opportunities become less predictable. A location outside the immediate reach of an opposing ground force may remain vulnerable to attack, while civilian authorities face difficulty identifying periods during which reconstruction or transport can proceed with acceptable security.

The expansion of aerial reach also creates a problem of distributed defence. Military authorities cannot concentrate all protective capabilities around a limited number of ground front lines if airports, fuel facilities, transport intersections and other important installations across distant regions are exposed to possible attack. They must allocate surveillance, protection and contingency resources across a wider geographical area, even where actual attacks are intermittent.

The fundamental issue is therefore not simply the number of drones available to each belligerent. It is the ability of relatively dispersed military organisations to impose recurring costs on a larger system of infrastructure, security and economic activity, forcing defenders to protect more locations than an attacker needs to threaten simultaneously. This disparity is central to the new economics of military reach.

Unmanned Aircraft Are Not a Single Military Capability: Distinguishing Operational Roles and Technical Limitations

The term drone is frequently used as though it describes a homogeneous class of equipment, yet the military functions performed by unmanned systems differ substantially. A small remotely piloted aircraft used for local observation cannot be assumed to possess the range, payload or communications requirements of a larger platform intended for sustained surveillance. Similarly, a one-way attack system performs a different mission from a reusable aircraft capable of returning after an operation.

These distinctions are necessary because the military and economic implications of a platform depend on its mission, not merely its unmanned configuration.

A surveillance platform may provide information about terrain, movement or activity without carrying a weapon. Its contribution depends on whether the collected information can be transmitted, interpreted and used by the relevant command structure. An armed reusable platform can potentially combine observation with the delivery of munitions, but it normally requires maintenance, suitable operating facilities, trained personnel and access to replacement components. A one-way attack system may be organised around a single mission rather than recovery and repeated operation, changing the relationship between acquisition cost, mission expenditure and equipment attrition.

The distinction between remotely piloted and increasingly automated systems also matters. An aircraft that navigates through predefined waypoints is not necessarily capable of independently selecting and engaging targets. The presence of automated navigation or flight-control functions does not establish autonomous weapons employment. Claims concerning autonomous targeting require evidence about how the system identifies targets, how human operators supervise its decisions and whether the engagement function is subject to meaningful human control.

In Sudan, publicly documented patterns of attacks demonstrate the increasing operational significance of unmanned aircraft, but they do not provide a complete, independently audited inventory identifying every platform deployed by each belligerent. Nor do casualty figures reveal the model of aircraft responsible for a particular attack. Attributing every long-range strike to one named manufacturer or aircraft type would create an appearance of technical precision that the verified institutional record does not support.

This does not prevent a rigorous assessment of the military transformation. Instead, it requires analysing the underlying functions through which unmanned systems affect operational reach, force protection, intelligence, logistics and military expenditure.

Table 2.1 — Functional Classification of Unmanned Aerial Systems and Their Operational Significance

System category	Primary military function	Principal enabling requirements	Economic characteristic	Main evidentiary limitation
Small observation UAV	Local reconnaissance and observation	Operators, communications, batteries or fuel, maintenance	May reduce dependence on some conventional observation activities	Equipment presence does not establish persistent surveillance coverage
Tactical reconnaissance UAV	Observation across a wider operating area	Launch and recovery arrangements, suitable communications, trained personnel	Creates recurring maintenance and data-processing requirements	Publicly stated endurance or range is not verified operational performance
Reusable armed UAV	Surveillance and delivery of weapons	Aircraft, munitions, trained crews, maintenance and operating facilities	Capital equipment may support repeated missions but remains vulnerable to attrition	Acquisition does not establish combat readiness or mission success
One-way attack UAV	Delivery of a payload during a single intended attack mission	Mission preparation, navigation, launch support and supply	Platform expenditure is generally associated with individual missions	Unit prices and effectiveness cannot be inferred from category alone
Longer-range unmanned strike system	Attack or surveillance beyond immediate ground-held territory	Reliable navigation, communications where required, technical support and logistical access	Can impose defensive costs across dispersed locations	Claimed range does not establish a verified launch point or operational radius
Unmanned systems integrated with ground intelligence	Support for wider military decision-making	Coordination between operators, analysts and command structures	Value depends on personnel and information processing as well as equipment	Presence of the aircraft does not prove effective integration

The categories describe military functions rather than verified Sudanese inventory quantities. The legal distinction between aircraft configuration and lawful employment is explained in Frequently Asked Questions: International Humanitarian Law and the Use of Drones in Armed Conflict — International Committee of the Red Cross — 2026.

An important consequence of this classification is that platform acquisition represents only one component of military capability. A technically sophisticated aircraft may produce limited military effects if spare parts are unavailable, operators are insufficiently trained, communications are unreliable or maintenance facilities cannot function. Conversely, less sophisticated equipment may become operationally important when integrated into a well-organised system of observation, command and logistics.

The relevant unit of analysis is therefore not the aircraft alone, but the complete organisational system required to employ it.

The Economics of Military Reach: Why Acquisition Cost Is an Inadequate Measure of Capability

The frequent description of drones as inexpensive weapons conceals a fundamental analytical problem. The acquisition price of an individual aircraft is only one element of the total cost required to create and sustain an operational capability.

A meaningful assessment must distinguish capital acquisition from recurring operating expenditure, the costs of supporting infrastructure, training, maintenance, replacement equipment and the expenditure associated with individual missions. It must also distinguish a platform’s nominal payload or endurance from the probability that it can successfully perform a mission under actual operational conditions.

A more useful framework is total capability cost, defined as the cumulative expenditure required to establish, operate, maintain and regenerate a functioning military capability over a specified period. This is not synonymous with the manufacturer’s advertised price or the initial contract value.

The principal cost categories include aircraft and associated equipment, initial personnel training, the preparation of operating facilities, communications and information systems, maintenance, replacement parts, the munitions consumed during operations, and the consequences of losses or technical failures. For reusable systems, service life and the number of operational missions matter. For one-way systems, replacement procurement and mission consumption are more central.

This distinction has direct relevance to Sudan because the country’s belligerents operate in an environment of prolonged conflict, difficult transportation conditions and reliance on different forms of external assistance. Equipment requiring sophisticated maintenance may impose additional logistical burdens, while systems capable of operating with more limited infrastructure can offer different advantages. Neither category is universally superior: the practical value depends on the mission, available resources and ability of the recipient organisation to sustain operations.

The economically decisive variable is the cost of achieving a verified military effect, not the cost of purchasing an aircraft. A relatively inexpensive system that repeatedly fails to reach its intended objective may be less economical than a more expensive system that performs a suitable mission reliably. Equally, an advanced reusable aircraft may become prohibitively expensive if its operational availability is low or its supporting infrastructure is repeatedly disrupted.

No sufficiently complete official Sudan-specific dataset has been established here to calculate comparable unit costs, sortie costs, platform-loss rates or cost-per-effect for the SAF and RSF. Assigning numerical values to these measures would therefore manufacture precision. The relevant comparison can nevertheless be made through the components required for a valid calculation.

Table 2.2 — The Military-Economic Variables Required to Evaluate Drone Capability

Economic variable	Measurement required	Why it matters	Error avoided
Initial acquisition expenditure	Verified contract price, currency, date, equipment included	Establishes the actual capital cost	Treating advertised prices as completed contract values
Operational availability	Mission-capable aircraft divided by relevant fleet inventory over a defined period	Measures usable capability rather than nominal possession	Equating delivered aircraft with available aircraft
Mission expenditure	Fuel or energy, personnel, munitions, maintenance and other attributable operating costs	Establishes recurring cost	Ignoring expenditure beyond the aircraft
Equipment attrition	Verified losses and replacement requirements over a defined period	Measures sustainability under combat conditions	Assuming every acquired platform remains operational
Maintenance burden	Labour, components, technical services and equipment downtime	Identifies continuing resource requirements	Treating maintenance as economically negligible
Communications dependency	Verified systems and support requirements	Determines operational continuity and reliability	Assuming command systems function without supporting infrastructure
Training requirements	Personnel hours, programme costs and proficiency evidence	Measures the capacity to regenerate qualified operators	Inferring competence from equipment deliveries
Mission effectiveness	Defined military objective and independently verified outcome	Connects expenditure to operational results	Confusing launch or strike reports with mission success
Defensive response cost	Verified expenditure on detection, protection, interception and recovery	Identifies costs imposed on the opposing force	Assuming the economic effects are limited to direct damage
Civilian externalities	Documented damage and disruption attributable to operations	Establishes broader economic harm	Excluding losses borne by noncombatants and public institutions

The table provides an accounting framework, not a numerical estimate of Sudanese military expenditure. Its purpose is to identify the documentary requirements for comparing military systems without confusing contractual acquisition, operational readiness and realised military effects.

The Defensive Cost Imbalance: Air Defence as a Resource-Allocation Problem

The growth of unmanned attacks creates pressures on air-defence organisations because threats may differ considerably in size, flight characteristics, detectability, speed and operational purpose. A system designed primarily to counter conventional aircraft may not perform equally well against every category of smaller unmanned aircraft, while surveillance equipment that can detect one type of threat may be less effective against another.

The relevant defensive challenge is consequently broader than the acquisition of additional missiles or guns. It concerns the integration of detection, identification, command decisions, appropriate protective measures and the ability to sustain defensive operations over time.

Air defence is an allocation problem before it is a question of weapons superiority. Every protective capability has constraints relating to geographical coverage, availability, maintenance, personnel and expenditure. When important facilities are distributed across a large territory, commanders must decide how much protection can realistically be provided to each location, and which risks must instead be managed through resilience, redundancy or contingency planning.

The economic imbalance becomes particularly important where an attacker can generate recurring threats against dispersed locations. A defender may be required to maintain surveillance and readiness even during periods when no attack occurs. This continuing expenditure can exceed the resources consumed by individual attacking platforms, although no general numerical exchange ratio can be assumed without information about the actual systems and defensive responses used.

An additional distinction is necessary between technical interception capability and protection of civilian services. A defensive system may successfully defeat some incoming threats while still failing to prevent the interruption of electricity, transport or medical operations. Conversely, a facility may remain functional through redundancy and effective contingency measures even when not every attack can be intercepted.

The strategic objective of defensive investment should therefore be the reduction of consequential losses, rather than an unsupported expectation of eliminating every possible aerial threat.

Sudan’s publicly documented attacks demonstrate why such distinctions matter. During the May 2025 escalation, the United Nations reported attacks affecting Port Sudan’s airport, fuel infrastructure and electricity facilities. In June 2026, the UN also reported attacks against electrical and fuel infrastructure around El Obeid, with associated disruptions to healthcare and water systems. These incidents establish the operational importance of protecting essential functions, but they do not provide sufficient evidence to calculate the performance of individual Sudanese air-defence systems. Port Sudan Drone Attacks: A Call to Protect Civilian Infrastructure — United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator — May 2025; Noon Briefing on Sudan and El Obeid — United Nations Secretary-General’s Spokesperson — June 2026.

Table 2.3 — Air-Defence and Protective Capability: Distinct Measures of Effectiveness

Capability dimension	Operational question	Necessary verification	Strategic consequence
Detection	Can relevant threats be identified sufficiently early?	Documented detection performance under relevant conditions	Determines the opportunity to initiate protective action
Identification	Can decision-makers distinguish relevant threats from other activity?	Verified identification and decision processes	Affects both defensive effectiveness and the risk of erroneous engagement
Engagement	Can available systems respond to the threat category?	Tested or documented operational performance	Determines whether interception is technically feasible
Availability	Are protective systems functioning when required?	Maintenance, staffing and mission-ready records	Distinguishes nominal coverage from actual protection
Sustainability	Can defence continue through repeated incidents?	Verified stocks, maintenance capacity and operating expenditure	Determines endurance rather than isolated success
Geographical protection	Which locations can realistically be covered?	Validated coverage information and terrain-related limitations	Influences the prioritisation of facilities
Infrastructure continuity	Do protected services remain operational?	Recovery times and service-availability records	Measures the outcome that matters to the wider economy
Civilian-risk management	Are protective actions consistent with applicable law and civilian safety?	Procedures, incident reviews and documented precautions	Prevents technical effectiveness from being mistaken for legal compliance

A useful distinction follows from the table: a country may possess air-defence equipment without possessing a comprehensive air-defence system, and may possess a functioning air-defence system without guaranteeing uninterrupted civilian services. Capability must be measured through verified operational performance and consequences, rather than manufacturer specifications or isolated battlefield claims.

The Geography of Repeated Aerial Attacks: Evidence from 2025–2026

The most significant evidence of Sudan’s changing aerial war is not a comprehensive inventory of aircraft, which remains unavailable in sufficiently verified form, but the expanding geographical distribution and consequences of documented attacks.

The sequence beginning in May 2025 demonstrated the vulnerability of locations previously considered relatively distant from the principal western and central battlefronts. Port Sudan had acquired exceptional importance as an international entry point and administrative centre supporting humanitarian operations. Its airport, fuel infrastructure and electrical facilities were therefore critical not merely to local economic activity but to the continuity of services extending across the country.

On 6 May 2025, the United Nations Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator reported that attacks had affected Port Sudan International Airport, a fuel-storage facility and a power transformer. The statement also identified attacks affecting Kassala and described previous strikes against power stations, water infrastructure and oil facilities elsewhere in Sudan. Port Sudan Drone Attacks: A Call to Protect Civilian Infrastructure — United Nations in Sudan — May 2025.

The United Nations subsequently reported attacks against Port Sudan over successive days, alongside incidents affecting Kosti, Kenana, Tendalti, Rabak and Um Ruwaba. By 12 May 2025, UN briefings described Port Sudan as having experienced drone attacks for a ninth consecutive day. Daily Press Briefing: Sudan and Continued Attacks on Civilian Infrastructure — United Nations Secretary-General’s Spokesperson — May 2025.

The strategic implication was not that the RSF had acquired the capacity to govern Port Sudan or occupy the eastern regions. Rather, the attacks demonstrated that geographically distant infrastructure could be exposed to operational disruption despite the absence of an associated ground occupation.

A second pattern emerged during the first half of 2026. The United Nations documented a substantial concentration of drone-related civilian casualties in Kordofan, while also reporting attacks in Blue Nile, White Nile and Khartoum. The May 2026 Human Rights Office statement recorded at least 28 attacks on markets resulting in civilian casualties and at least 12 attacks affecting healthcare facilities during January–April. It further reported that an attack on Khartoum International Airport on 4 May 2026 disrupted flights and that multiple attacks occurred in Khartoum and Omdurman between 28 April and 5 May. Türk Issues High Alert on Widening Sudan Conflict amid Increased Use of Drones — United Nations Human Rights Office — May 2026.

These incidents reveal two analytically distinct operational effects. The first is the capacity to generate physical damage or casualties at locations removed from the immediate deployment areas of ground forces. The second is the capacity to disrupt activity through recurring threats and the resulting uncertainty over safety. An airport or market may experience operational interruption because of damage, because the relevant authorities suspend activity as a precaution, or because personnel and users judge the risk unacceptable.

The two mechanisms should not be confused. Physical destruction and temporary operational interruption have different recovery requirements, financial consequences and implications for military effectiveness.

Table 2.4 — Verified Geographical Expansion and Effects of Drone Warfare

Date or period	Location	Documented incident or pattern	Verified consequence	Military-economic significance
January–May 2025	Several Sudanese states	Repeated attacks affecting electricity, water and energy installations	Widespread disruptions to essential services	Demonstrates exposure beyond immediate ground engagements
4–12 May 2025	Port Sudan	Repeated reported drone attacks affecting transport and energy infrastructure	Airport and humanitarian-logistics disruption	Shows vulnerability of nationally important facilities far from principal ground fighting
May 2025	Kassala	Reported airport-area attack	Additional displacement among people sheltering near the airport	Demonstrates the insecurity of displacement-reception locations
January–April 2026	Kordofan and other affected regions	Intensified use of armed drones	At least 880 documented civilian deaths attributed to drone strikes nationwide	Demonstrates the rising civilian burden of aerial warfare
January–April 2026	Multiple Sudanese states	Attacks affecting markets and health facilities	At least 28 market attacks causing civilian casualties and 12 strikes involving health facilities	Shows recurring effects on civilian economic and medical activity
4 May 2026	Khartoum International Airport	Drone strike reported by OHCHR	Disruption of all flights	Illustrates the vulnerability of restored national transport functions
June 2026	El Obeid	Attacks affecting electricity and fuel infrastructure	Reported healthcare closures and water-supply disruption	Demonstrates the interaction between aerial attacks and essential service continuity
June 2026	North and South Kordofan transport routes	Reported attacks affecting bridges and road-related locations	Increased uncertainty over movement and access	Shows how attacks can affect regional mobility without permanent occupation

Sources: United Nations Port Sudan Statement — May 2025; United Nations Daily Briefing — May 2025; United Nations Human Rights Office — May 2026; United Nations Secretary-General’s Spokesperson — June 2026.

The incidents cannot be transformed into a complete national strike count because the reporting periods, verification standards and categories differ. They nonetheless support the conclusion that aerial attacks have expanded across multiple regions and have affected functions extending beyond immediate battlefield targets.

The Operational Significance of the Rainy Season: Erosion of a Traditional Constraint on Warfare

Sudan’s environmental conditions have historically influenced military mobility, the accessibility of transport routes and the seasonal distribution of humanitarian activities. The expansion of unmanned aerial warfare introduces an important change because certain aerial missions can continue when heavy rainfall and deteriorating road conditions impede ground movement. This does not render the rainy season operationally irrelevant, nor does it mean that unmanned aircraft can fly under all meteorological conditions. Instead, it reduces the degree to which some forms of military activity must follow the same seasonal pattern as ground operations.

The United Nations made this connection explicitly in May 2026, warning that the growing reliance on armed drones could sustain hostilities during a period that previously brought some reduction in ground fighting. United Nations Human Rights Office Warning on Drone Warfare — May 2026.

The economic consequences are significant. Agricultural production, humanitarian delivery and the movement of essential goods already depend on seasonal conditions. If aerial insecurity persists when ground access becomes more difficult, communities may face simultaneous restrictions on mobility and economic activity. A population centre may become harder to resupply by road while remaining vulnerable to military attack, creating conditions in which infrastructure disruption and logistical isolation reinforce one another.

The change also affects the allocation of military resources. Forces may need to sustain aerial surveillance, defensive readiness and infrastructure protection throughout periods when conventional ground manoeuvre becomes more difficult. The financial burden of maintaining readiness therefore extends into seasons that might otherwise allow some reduction in operational expenditure.

The strategic effect should be understood as a change in the temporal continuity of military pressure, not as proof that drones have eliminated geographical or environmental constraints. Weather, infrastructure availability and logistical support continue to determine the practical viability of operations. Nevertheless, the documented ability to sustain aerial attacks across changing seasonal conditions complicates assumptions about when civilian recovery or humanitarian activity can proceed safely.

Long-Range Strike Capability and the Problem of Strategic Attribution

The capacity to attack a geographically distant location can suggest the use of systems with significant operational reach, but it does not automatically reveal the platform employed, its point of origin or the identity of all participants involved. These questions require distinct categories of evidence.

A verified strike location identifies where an event occurred. Physical remnants may support conclusions about a particular munition or platform, provided that the evidence is appropriately collected and authenticated. Communications records, radar observations or other technical information may help establish a flight path. Procurement documentation may identify the transfer of equipment. Command records may establish the responsibility of particular personnel or organisations.

None of these evidentiary categories can safely substitute for all the others. The discovery of equipment manufactured in one country does not establish that the aircraft was launched from that country. The identification of a weapon model does not establish its complete transfer history. The observation of an attack does not establish that the armed organisation publicly claiming responsibility exercised direct control over every stage of the operation.

The importance of this distinction is particularly clear in Sudan, where the international procurement environment is complex and competing parties have made allegations concerning foreign involvement. Statements by Sudanese authorities at the United Nations may be important evidence of the state’s formal position, but allegations about launch locations, foreign operators or command relationships must be independently assessed before being adopted as established technical findings.

For operational analysis, the safest approach is to distinguish four questions: what was attacked, what physical effects occurred, what weapon or platform can be independently identified, and which actor can be reliably attributed with the operation. A source may answer some of these questions without establishing the others.

This discipline has consequences for the evaluation of air defence as well. A publicly reported interception does not necessarily prove the destruction of a particular platform unless the evidence supports that identification. It also does not establish the overall effectiveness of the defensive system, because a complete assessment requires information about the number and characteristics of threats encountered, the defensive response and the outcome of relevant engagements.

Similarly, the loss of a reusable aircraft does not by itself demonstrate the superiority of the system reportedly responsible for destroying it. Equipment can be lost through mechanical failure, operational error, hostile engagement or other causes. A credible technical assessment must therefore separate manufacturer specifications, verified field deployment and independently established combat performance.

These distinctions are not obstacles to understanding Sudan’s military transformation. They are necessary to avoid presenting contested battlefield claims as reliable quantitative measures of technological superiority.

The Interaction Between Drone Warfare and International Military-Service Networks

The expanding use of unmanned aircraft also creates organisational requirements extending beyond equipment acquisition. Skilled personnel may be needed for operation, maintenance, mission planning, information analysis and training. These functions can be performed within an established national military organisation or supplied through foreign personnel and commercial relationships.

The documented foreign recruitment arrangements supporting Sudan’s conflict show that technical and military services can form part of internationally distributed support structures. Their existence does not identify the operator responsible for every drone strike, but it establishes that military expertise is one component of the conflict’s international support environment.

The strategic significance lies in the transferability of operational knowledge. Once a military organisation acquires personnel familiar with a specialised capability, it may become better positioned to train additional operators, adapt procedures or integrate equipment into its wider command structure. The magnitude of the effect depends on the actual skills transferred, the duration of assistance and the recipient’s ability to sustain the capability independently.

External personnel may also create dependencies. A system that requires continuing support from a small group of specialists may be difficult to maintain if those individuals become unavailable. The organisation may possess the equipment but lack the personnel necessary to operate it reliably.

This produces a distinction between access to expertise and institutionalisation of expertise. Temporary access can support particular operations; institutionalisation requires training, documentation, maintenance practices and sufficient organisational continuity to preserve knowledge after individual personnel depart.

The difference matters for sanctions and export-control policy. Measures that restrict equipment supply may have limited effects where a recipient already possesses substantial inventories, while measures affecting particular technical services may influence operational sustainability. Conversely, once expertise has been transferred and incorporated into local organisations, restricting the original service provider may not eliminate the capability.

The resulting policy problem is long-term. International enforcement must be concerned not only with the movement of physical materiel, but also with relevant prohibited services and documented commercial relationships, while remaining within applicable legal authority.

The Civilian Casualty Record: What the Numbers Establish and What They Do Not

The scale of drone-related civilian harm recorded in 2026 provides the strongest quantitative evidence of the changing consequences of Sudan’s aerial war.

The UN Human Rights Office reported more than 500 civilian deaths associated with drone strikes between 1 January and 15 March 2026. In the first two weeks of March alone, the office received information concerning more than 277 civilian deaths, over three-quarters of which were attributed to drone strikes. Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: Sudan — United Nations Human Rights Office — March 2026.

By 11 May, the reporting period had expanded to January–April, with at least 880 civilian deaths attributed to drones. During the Security Council’s August 2026 deliberations, UN officials referred to approximately 1,400 documented civilian deaths during the first half of 2026, including more than 1,100 associated with drone attacks. The humanitarian briefing described the drone-related figure as exceeding 1,120. Sudan and South Sudan, Security Council 10211th Meeting — United Nations — August 2026.

These figures describe successive reporting periods and should not be added. The January–March and January–April observations form part of the broader first-half picture, subject to revisions in the underlying verification record.

They also do not establish the total number of people killed in Sudan during the corresponding periods. OHCHR monitoring records are constrained by restricted access, communications difficulties and the practical challenges of documenting incidents during active conflict. The reported figures therefore establish the scale of casualties captured by the monitoring process rather than a complete national mortality census.

Table 2.5 — Drone-Related Civilian Fatalities: Chronological Verification

Reporting date	Reference period	Drone-related civilian deaths	Denominator or comparison	Interpretation
24 March 2026	1 January–15 March 2026	More than 500	More than 277 civilians reportedly killed in the first two weeks of March, over three-quarters in drone strikes	Early evidence of substantial drone-related mortality
11 May 2026	January–April 2026	At least 880	More than 80% of documented conflict-related civilian deaths in that period	Demonstrates dominance of drones within that reporting record
August 2026 UN Security Council briefing	January–June 2026	More than 1,100; the humanitarian briefing specified more than 1,120	Approximately 1,400 documented civilian deaths	Indicates approximately four-fifths of documented civilian fatalities involved drone strikes

Sources: OHCHR Statement — March 2026; OHCHR Statement — May 2026; Security Council Briefing — August 2026.

The progression supports a substantial increase in the documented significance of drone attacks, but it does not permit calculation of a complete national attack rate, the number of aircraft employed or an independently verified casualty rate per mission. The figures also do not support the conclusion that all civilian deaths attributed to drones were caused by one belligerent. Attribution must remain incident-specific.

The UN record has a further implication for military economics. A weapon system that can be employed repeatedly or at geographical distance may generate substantial civilian consequences even where its direct effect on the military balance is difficult to measure. Civilian mortality must therefore be assessed independently of military effectiveness. The capacity to inflict casualties does not establish that a weapon has achieved a legitimate military objective or contributed to a sustainable strategic advantage.

The Legal Limits of Remote Warfare: Technology Does Not Change the Protection Owed to Civilians

Unmanned aircraft do not create a separate legal category in which the ordinary rules governing attacks cease to apply. The International Committee of the Red Cross makes clear that armed drones are not generally prohibited as weapons solely because they are unmanned. Their use remains subject to the applicable rules of international humanitarian law, including distinction, proportionality and precautions in attack.

The principle of distinction requires parties to direct attacks only against lawful military objectives and not against civilians or civilian objects. Proportionality prohibits attacks expected to cause incidental civilian harm excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. Precautions require feasible measures to verify targets and minimise civilian harm. The use of a more accurate or remotely operated weapon does not remove any of these obligations. Frequently Asked Questions: International Humanitarian Law and the Use of Drones in Armed Conflict — International Committee of the Red Cross — 2026.

This distinction is particularly relevant where the presence of aerial surveillance may create an impression that operators possess complete information about the intended target. Technical observation does not necessarily reveal the identities of all people present, the function of every structure or the indirect consequences of damage to essential infrastructure.

A communications system, road, fuel installation or electrical facility may serve both civilian and military functions. Its possible military relevance does not automatically authorise an attack. The object must satisfy the applicable definition of a military objective, and the planned operation must comply with the remaining legal requirements.

The ICRC has also emphasised that the foreseeable indirect consequences of attacks against infrastructure must be taken into account. Damage to electricity supply, for example, can affect water pumping, medical equipment, refrigeration and other essential services even where the immediate physical destruction is geographically limited. International Humanitarian Law and the Challenges of Contemporary Armed Conflicts — International Review of the Red Cross.

For Sudan, this establishes a critical distinction between technical precision and legally compliant employment. An aircraft may deliver a weapon accurately to a selected location while the attack remains unlawful because the target is civilian, the expected incidental harm is excessive or feasible precautions were not taken.

The growing use of drones should therefore not be described as inherently precise warfare. Precision is one possible technical characteristic, while lawful employment depends on the target, available information, anticipated consequences and decisions made by responsible personnel.

The New Economics of Strategic Denial

The expansion of unmanned warfare has produced a form of military pressure that can be described as strategic denial through recurring disruption. The purpose of this concept is not to attribute a uniform intention to all attacks. It identifies the operational effect that can arise when repeated threats reduce the ability of an adversary or civilian administration to rely on particular infrastructure, transport connections or economic activities.

The value of this effect depends on the importance of the affected function. A temporary disruption to a redundant installation may have limited strategic consequences. A comparable interruption at a facility for which there is no available substitute can produce disproportionately severe effects.

The resulting relationship between attack expenditure and defensive loss is not necessarily linear. A single incident may produce limited physical damage while causing prolonged operational interruption because essential components cannot be replaced quickly. Repeated threats may impose costs through protective measures, delayed transportation or the suspension of services even without further major destruction.

At the same time, the ability to impose disruption should not be confused with the capacity to achieve strategic victory. Repeated aerial attacks may degrade an adversary’s infrastructure without creating the political legitimacy, personnel or administrative capability necessary to govern additional territory.

This limitation is central to the Sudanese conflict. Long-range military reach can sustain pressure across dispersed areas, but the outcome of the wider war remains dependent on ground forces, logistics, political authority, coalition relationships and the ability to establish durable institutions.

Unmanned warfare therefore expands the range of methods through which the belligerents can impose costs, while leaving unresolved the principal political and organisational obstacles to a sustainable settlement.

Key Judgments — Chapter 2

Sudan’s unmanned warfare has changed the geographical and seasonal constraints governing military operations. The United Nations has documented the expansion of drone attacks across several states and warned that reliance on aerial systems permits continued hostilities during periods that previously constrained ground operations.

The verified casualty record demonstrates the severity of the civilian consequences. More than 1,100 drone-related civilian deaths were documented during the first half of 2026, representing approximately four-fifths of the civilian fatalities recorded in the relevant UN monitoring framework.

The economics of unmanned warfare cannot be assessed through acquisition prices alone. Effective capability depends on personnel, maintenance, operational availability, communications, replacement equipment and the ability to achieve verified mission outcomes.

Air defence must be measured through the continuity of protected functions rather than nominal equipment inventories. The ability to intercept particular threats is only one component of the wider requirement to preserve essential infrastructure and military operations.

Manufacturer identification, transfer history, launch location and operational command are separate evidentiary questions. Assertions concerning foreign involvement or technological superiority require evidence sufficient to establish each proposition independently.

The proliferation of unmanned systems increases the importance of specialised military services and knowledge transfer. Such dependencies can influence the duration and sustainability of military capabilities beyond the initial purchase of equipment.

What Would Change the Assessment — Chapter 2

The evaluation of the military balance would improve substantially with reliable, comparable records concerning aircraft inventories, operational availability, verified platform losses, mission expenditure, maintenance capacity and independently established outcomes. Such evidence would permit a more precise assessment of the costs and effectiveness of competing aerial and defensive systems.

The assessment of the wider strategic threat would change if documented attacks declined over a sustained period, essential infrastructure achieved greater operational continuity and the geographical expansion of aerial operations was reversed. Conversely, independently verified increases in the number of affected regions, the frequency of civilian infrastructure disruption or the transfer of sophisticated capabilities to additional armed organisations would strengthen the conclusion that Sudan’s conflict is entering a more persistent form of technologically enabled military pressure.

The final assessment of Chapter 2 is that unmanned warfare has expanded the ability to project violence across Sudan without resolving the military and political conditions required for national stabilisation. Its most consequential effect is the redistribution of costs: relatively localised military activity can impose extensive defensive, economic and civilian burdens across a much wider territory.

Chapter 3. Civilian Infrastructure, Humanitarian Security and Territorial Fragmentation

Infrastructure as the Foundation of Civilian Security: Why Territorial Recovery Cannot Be Equated with Stabilisation

The destruction and repeated disruption of civilian infrastructure have become central mechanisms through which Sudan’s conflict undermines the viability of economic activity, public administration, humanitarian assistance and population recovery. The significance of these developments cannot be understood solely through the physical value of damaged installations or the immediate casualties associated with individual attacks. Essential infrastructure forms an interconnected system in which electricity, water, transport, healthcare, communications and commercial distribution depend upon one another. Damage affecting one component can therefore interrupt other functions far beyond the initial location, creating losses that persist after the immediate military incident has ended.

The fundamental issue is the erosion of functional security. A civilian population may reside within territory controlled by an established authority while lacking reliable access to drinking water, electricity, healthcare, transport and food distribution. Under such circumstances, territorial control provides an incomplete measure of security because the institutions responsible for maintaining ordinary life cannot reliably perform their functions. This distinction is particularly important in Sudan, where military campaigns have repeatedly changed the authorities controlling major urban centres while infrastructure damage, economic disruption and humanitarian insecurity have continued.

The United Nations identified this problem during the May 2025 attacks on Port Sudan, warning that damage to fuel-storage installations, electrical facilities and the principal humanitarian airport could affect aid distribution throughout the country. The UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator emphasised that fuel availability in Port Sudan was essential to the dispatch of humanitarian supplies and that attacks against critical facilities could disrupt supply chains and increase the prices of basic goods. Port Sudan Drone Attacks: A Call to Protect Civilian Infrastructure — United Nations in Sudan — May 2025.

The strategic importance of this assessment lies in the relationship between localised physical damage and geographically distributed humanitarian consequences. A fuel installation serves a particular location, but the transport operations dependent upon its output may extend across numerous regions. An airport operates within one city, yet its closure can affect the movement of humanitarian personnel, specialised medical supplies and other essential materials destined for distant populations. The physical boundaries of an installation therefore do not define the geographical limits of its economic or humanitarian importance.

This creates a critical distinction between the direct and indirect consequences of military operations. Direct effects may include destruction, fire, casualties and immediate interruption. Indirect effects arise when dependent services cease to function, alternative supply arrangements become unavailable, costs increase or populations change their behaviour because the reliability of essential systems has deteriorated.

The indirect consequences can become especially severe in a country where infrastructure had already been weakened by prolonged conflict, underinvestment and the displacement of qualified personnel. Restoration may require imported components, specialised expertise, secure transportation and functioning public institutions. Repeated attacks can undermine each of these requirements, creating a cycle in which emergency repairs consume resources that would otherwise support more durable reconstruction.

The central assessment of this chapter is that Sudan’s territorial fragmentation is becoming reinforced by infrastructure fragmentation. Different regions may possess nominal administrative authorities while remaining dependent on damaged, disrupted or geographically inaccessible systems whose operation is essential to civilian survival. The ability to reconstruct national institutions consequently depends not only on negotiated political arrangements but also on restoring the networks through which services can be delivered across territorial boundaries.

The Electricity–Water–Health Nexus: Cascading Failures Across Essential Services

Electricity is a foundational component of modern civilian infrastructure because it supports activities whose vulnerability is not always apparent from the physical characteristics of the power system itself. Water abstraction and distribution, hospital equipment, telecommunications, food refrigeration and many forms of industrial or agricultural production depend on reliable energy supply.

Where electricity becomes unavailable, the consequences depend upon the resilience of the affected services. Facilities possessing functioning backup equipment, fuel and maintenance capacity may continue operating temporarily. Others may experience immediate interruption. Prolonged outages can therefore produce a pattern of unequal consequences in which facilities with fewer resources become nonfunctional more rapidly.

Sudan’s conflict demonstrates this relationship through documented attacks affecting electricity infrastructure and the subsequent disruption of water and medical services. In its 22 June 2026 briefing, the United Nations reported drone attacks against a power substation and fuel station in El Obeid. According to information attributed to the Sudan Doctors Network and local sources, the attacks contributed to closures of medical facilities, including a dialysis centre, while water stations also ceased functioning. Noon Briefing on Sudan, El Obeid and Attacks on Essential Infrastructure — United Nations Secretary-General’s Spokesperson — June 2026.

The closure of a dialysis centre illustrates the distinctive consequences of service interruption. Some medical treatments cannot be postponed indefinitely or substituted through ordinary household measures. Patients who depend on specialised equipment may need to travel to distant facilities, where treatment availability may itself be uncertain. The resulting health consequences can therefore extend beyond the initial attack and affect individuals who were never physically present near the damaged installation.

Water supply presents a similarly interconnected problem. Pumping, treatment and distribution may depend on electricity, fuel, replacement components and qualified technicians. Where electricity is interrupted, operators may attempt to use generators, but this introduces dependence on fuel procurement and maintenance. Where both electricity and fuel availability are constrained, emergency water distribution may become more expensive or impossible to sustain.

The consequences extend into public health. Reduced access to safe drinking water, damaged sanitation systems and overcrowded displacement sites create conditions favourable to waterborne disease transmission. The relationship is not automatic: disease outcomes depend on population movement, existing immunity, sanitation practices, rainfall and public-health response. Nevertheless, the combination of disrupted water systems and reduced healthcare capacity creates a clearly identifiable pathway through which infrastructure damage can contribute to a wider health emergency.

UNICEF documented the consequences at community level in El Obeid in July 2026, reporting that intensified attacks had damaged homes, markets, schools and water infrastructure and that nearly one million people continued to feel the effects of insecurity and pressure on essential services. The agency described families facing prolonged water shortages and relying on emergency distribution arrangements. Without Water There Is No Life — UNICEF Sudan — July 2026.

This evidence demonstrates that the economic consequences of attacks cannot be measured solely through engineering repair costs. The loss of a water service imposes additional costs on households, humanitarian organisations and public authorities. Families may have to devote time and money to obtaining alternative supplies, while emergency water distribution requires vehicles, fuel, personnel and repeated logistical operations.

The resulting expenditure may continue for weeks or months even after the initial physical damage has occurred.

Table 3.1 — Infrastructure Interdependencies and the Transmission of Civilian Harm

Primary infrastructure affected	Immediate functional consequence	Dependent civilian services	Possible secondary economic or humanitarian effect	Appropriate evidence for measuring damage
Electricity generation or distribution	Loss or reduction of power supply	Water pumping, healthcare, communications, refrigeration and productive activity	Service suspension, increased generator-fuel demand and economic disruption	Outage duration, affected customers and verified service interruptions
Fuel storage or distribution	Reduced fuel availability	Transport, electricity backup systems, agricultural machinery and emergency logistics	Higher transport costs and reduced continuity of essential services	Verified fuel availability, distribution records and operational shutdowns
Water pumping or treatment	Reduced access to treated water	Household consumption, sanitation, hospitals and community facilities	Health risks, additional household expenditure and emergency distribution costs	Water output, service coverage and water-quality data
Healthcare facility	Loss of medical capacity	Emergency care, chronic treatment, maternal health and disease management	Increased preventable harm and additional patient transportation	Verified facility status, service interruptions and affected patient populations
Airport	Suspension or restriction of flights	Humanitarian air operations, personnel movement and specialised supply delivery	Delayed assistance and increased reliance on alternative routes	Flight records, closure duration and verified transport substitution
Road or bridge	Restricted movement	Food distribution, evacuation, commercial delivery and humanitarian access	Higher transportation costs, reduced market supply and geographic isolation	Traffic restoration, accessibility and delivery data
Telecommunications	Reduced connectivity	Emergency coordination, commercial transactions and public administration	Communication delays, reduced coordination and interrupted services	Network availability and verified functional coverage
Schools and educational facilities	Suspension or reduction of education services	Children, teachers and surrounding communities	Learning loss, protection concerns and additional household burdens	Attendance, reopening records and facility condition assessments

The observed relationships are consistent with the United Nations Port Sudan Infrastructure Statement — May 2025, United Nations El Obeid Briefing — June 2026, and UNICEF Assessment of Water Insecurity in El Obeid — July 2026.

The table identifies causal pathways rather than claiming that every listed consequence occurred after every documented attack. A complete quantitative loss assessment would require facility-level data on the duration of interruption, the size of the population served and the availability of substitute infrastructure.

Agricultural Production and the Hidden Economic Costs of Electricity Failure

The disruption of electricity in Sudan can have consequences for agricultural production that are not adequately captured by the direct repair costs of damaged power infrastructure. Irrigated agriculture often depends upon pumping systems, reliable fuel or electrical supply, functioning transport and access to markets. When one of these inputs becomes unavailable during a critical production period, agricultural losses may occur even if farmland itself is not physically attacked.

The United Nations reported a particularly significant example on 6 May 2025, stating that a month-long power outage affecting Northern State had prevented farmers from operating electrically powered water pumps and contributed to the destruction of more than 84 square kilometres of crops. Expressed in hectares, this is more than 8,400 hectares, using the exact conversion of 100 hectares per square kilometre. Noon Briefing of 6 May 2025 — United Nations Secretary-General.

This figure is important because it offers a documented example of infrastructure disruption producing an economic and food-production consequence beyond the immediate installation. It does not, however, establish the monetary value of the losses, the market value of the affected crops or the proportion of Sudan’s national agricultural output represented by the damage. Such calculations would require crop identification, production estimates, yields, prices, irrigation costs and the relevant agricultural season.

The policy significance is nevertheless clear. Electricity infrastructure can function as an indirect determinant of food production, and its disruption can generate agricultural losses even where there is no direct attack on agricultural land.

The timing of an interruption matters as much as its geographical extent. A power outage occurring during a period when crops require irrigation may create irreversible losses, while an outage of similar duration during another production stage may have different consequences. Agricultural resilience therefore depends on the relationship between infrastructure reliability, seasonal conditions and the capacity to maintain alternative water supplies.

For households dependent on farming income, crop loss can affect purchasing power, repayment obligations, access to food and the ability to finance the following production cycle. At the regional level, reduced output may increase dependence on supplies transported from other areas, raising vulnerability where roads, fuel and commercial logistics are also disrupted.

These effects demonstrate why infrastructure protection and agricultural recovery cannot be treated as separate planning exercises. Restoring electricity without ensuring that irrigation equipment can operate may fail to recover production. Repairing pumps without reliable electricity or fuel may produce equally limited results.

The appropriate unit of reconstruction planning is therefore the functioning agricultural production system rather than the isolated asset.

Health Infrastructure: Direct Attacks, Service Closure and the Loss of Medical Resilience

Sudan’s healthcare system has experienced destruction, displacement of medical personnel, shortages of supplies, financial constraints and repeated attacks. These pressures have created a situation in which the loss of additional facilities can have consequences far greater than their individual physical capacity might suggest.

On 14 April 2026, the World Health Organization reported that 37% of Sudan’s health facilities were nonfunctional, while approximately 21 million people lacked access to essential healthcare services. The organisation had verified 217 attacks on healthcare since 15 April 2023, associated with 2,052 deaths and 810 injuries at the reporting date. These figures describe the WHO’s verified attack-on-healthcare monitoring framework and should not be treated as the total number of hospitals destroyed or as a count solely of drone attacks. After Three Years of Conflict, Sudan Faces a Deeper Health Crisis — World Health Organization — April 2026.

The seriousness of the trend is reinforced by more recent information. On 12 October 2026, WHO reported that the cumulative number of verified attacks on healthcare had risen to 228, associated with 2,055 deaths and 817 injuries. The difference between the April and October figures reflects subsequent reporting within the monitoring system, not a complete measure of all violence affecting healthcare in Sudan. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — World Health Organization — October 2026.

The practical consequences of healthcare disruption depend on the functions lost. A hospital may provide emergency surgery, maternal care, infectious disease treatment, laboratory services and ongoing management of chronic illness. Its closure may therefore remove several forms of medical capacity simultaneously.

Patients seeking urgent treatment may need to travel farther, often through insecure territory. Healthcare personnel may be displaced or unable to work safely. Medicines and medical equipment may become unavailable because transportation is disrupted. Where a specialised facility closes, substitute care may not exist within a reasonable distance.

These effects create a compounding loss of medical resilience. Each additional interruption places pressure on the facilities that remain operational, increasing patient volumes and the consumption of scarce supplies. The resulting system can become progressively less able to absorb future attacks, disease outbreaks or population movements.

The hospital attack reported in March 2026 at El Daein in East Darfur illustrates the severity of this vulnerability. WHO identified the attack as having killed at least 64 people and rendered the hospital nonfunctional. The facility had served as a major referral centre for a population extending beyond the immediate city. After Three Years of Conflict, Sudan Faces a Deeper Health Crisis — WHO — April 2026.

The strategic issue is not merely the loss of one building. It is the interruption of a referral system upon which other health facilities and communities depended.

Table 3.2 — Sudan’s Healthcare System: Verified Indicators and Changes in the Reporting Record

Indicator	Value	Reference date or period	Definition	Analytical significance
Health facilities reported nonfunctional	37%	April 2026	National share reported by WHO	Indicates the scale of service-capacity disruption
People lacking access to essential healthcare	Approximately 21 million	April 2026	WHO estimate	Demonstrates the extent of unmet healthcare needs
Verified attacks on healthcare	217	Cumulative from 15 April 2023 to April 2026	WHO verified attacks	Establishes a minimum documented pattern of violence affecting healthcare
Deaths associated with verified attacks on healthcare	2,052	Same cumulative reporting period	WHO monitoring record	Demonstrates the severe lethality of documented incidents
Injuries associated with verified attacks on healthcare	810	Same cumulative reporting period	WHO monitoring record	Additional direct burden on affected populations
Verified attacks on healthcare	228	Cumulative to October 2026	Updated WHO record	Shows further documented incidents
Associated deaths	2,055	Cumulative to October 2026	Updated WHO record	Revised cumulative mortality figure
Associated injuries	817	Cumulative to October 2026	Updated WHO record	Revised cumulative injury figure
WHO humanitarian appeal funding	23% of US$97.7 million	October 2026	Funding reported against the WHO appeal	Indicates resource constraints on health and nutrition response

Sources: World Health Organization — April 2026 Health Crisis Assessment; World Health Organization — October 2026 Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert.

The changes in cumulative attack, death and injury figures should not be interpreted as an exact count of new casualties occurring between the two publication dates, because the monitoring record may be revised or supplemented as earlier incidents are verified. The figures establish the respective official reporting vintages.

Humanitarian Logistics and the National Consequences of Disrupting Strategic Entry Points

Sudan’s humanitarian emergency depends on supply networks extending across national and international boundaries. These networks require functioning entry points, transport infrastructure, personnel, fuel, warehousing and agreements allowing assistance to reach affected populations. The destruction or interruption of a strategically important facility can therefore influence the entire humanitarian system even when the facility is geographically distant from those most in need.

The May 2025 attacks on Port Sudan established this relationship with particular clarity. Port Sudan International Airport was an important entry point for humanitarian personnel and supplies, while fuel availability in the city supported the transportation of assistance elsewhere. The United Nations reported that flights operated by the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service were suspended following the attacks. Daily Press Briefing on Sudan and Port Sudan Humanitarian Operations — United Nations — May 2025.

The humanitarian consequences of an airport suspension depend on several factors, including the duration of closure, the availability of alternative airports, the condition of roads and the urgency of the goods or personnel being transported.

Not all humanitarian supplies require air transportation. Large-volume assistance can often move more economically by road or sea where secure and functional routes are available. However, specialised medical supplies, personnel rotations and urgent movements may depend upon air connections. An interruption affecting these functions can produce consequences disproportionate to the physical size of the airport itself.

Fuel infrastructure has a similarly broad significance. Fuel may be required for road transport, generators, emergency water systems and the operation of humanitarian facilities. Its availability consequently affects the cost and continuity of several distinct services.

The loss of fuel supply can generate a cascading humanitarian problem. Organisations may have resources committed and goods available in storage but lack the transportation capacity necessary to move them. Facilities may possess backup generators but have insufficient fuel to operate them. Water-distribution vehicles may be available but unable to maintain their delivery schedules.

These relationships show why humanitarian logistics should be evaluated as a functioning network rather than a series of individual shipments.

The strategic importance of a humanitarian entry point depends on how difficult it is to substitute its functions when disrupted. A facility that can be replaced quickly by several alternative routes may present a manageable operational risk. One that serves as the principal available connection for particular supplies or personnel represents a much more serious vulnerability.

Table 3.3 — Humanitarian Logistics: Critical Functions and Failure Mechanisms

Logistical function	Essential dependencies	Potential disruption	Humanitarian consequence	Appropriate continuity indicator
International airport access	Runways, air traffic services, fuel, security and personnel	Flight suspension or restricted operations	Delayed movement of personnel and urgent supplies	Verified flight availability and duration of interruption
Seaport reception	Port facilities, handling equipment, customs processes and onward transport	Reduced cargo throughput	Delayed arrival or dispatch of assistance	Cargo-handling records and delivery times
Road distribution	Bridges, roads, vehicles, fuel and secure passage	Route closure or increased risk	Reduced ability to reach affected communities	Verified corridor accessibility and delivery completion
Fuel availability	Storage, transportation and distribution facilities	Shortages or distribution interruption	Reduced transport and backup-power capacity	Fuel availability at operational delivery points
Humanitarian warehousing	Storage structures, staff, records and security	Inventory loss or inability to dispatch goods	Reduced assistance continuity	Verified inventory availability and dispatch capability
Telecommunications	Network access, devices, power and communications security	Loss of operational coordination	Delays in transport and programme management	Functional communications availability
Cross-border humanitarian delivery	Legal authorisation, functioning routes, partner capacity and safe access	Border or corridor restrictions	Inability to reach isolated populations	Verified deliveries and population coverage
Local distribution	Community organisations, access arrangements and transport	Insecurity or displacement	Failure to deliver supplies to intended beneficiaries	Distribution verification and beneficiary access

The documented risks to Port Sudan’s humanitarian infrastructure are established in the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator’s Statement — May 2025 and the United Nations Operational Briefing — May 2025.

The table differentiates logistics functions because expenditure and performance cannot be assessed through the total volume of aid entering Sudan alone. Supplies delivered to a national entry point do not necessarily reach the communities requiring assistance, and successful transportation does not establish uninterrupted provision of services.

Reconstruction Under Persistent Insecurity: The Difference Between Repairing Assets and Restoring Systems

The restoration of damaged infrastructure involves several stages that are often incorrectly combined in public reconstruction estimates. Physical repair concerns the replacement or restoration of damaged components. Functional recovery concerns the resumption of service. Sustainable recovery requires the service to remain operational under reasonably predictable financial, technical and security conditions.

These stages can produce very different results.

A water-treatment facility may be physically repaired but remain unable to operate because electricity is unavailable. A hospital may reopen a building while lacking personnel, medicines or functional equipment. A road may be cleared but remain unreliable because nearby fighting prevents routine movement. Under these conditions, the asset exists, but its contribution to civilian recovery remains limited.

A credible reconstruction assessment must therefore measure service continuity, not merely the number of facilities repaired.

UNICEF’s mid-year 2026 report provides evidence of substantial restoration activity despite the conflict. During the first six months of the year, UNICEF and partners reported providing 6.6 million people with access to safe water, while rehabilitation and construction of 120 urban water facilities reached approximately 2.2 million people. The agency also described measures intended to reduce reliance on diesel fuel, including solarisation of water infrastructure.

In Nyala, South Darfur, UNICEF reported that rehabilitation and solarisation of important urban water facilities had restored more reliable drinking-water access for approximately 600,000 people. The agency stated that the broader water response included emergency chlorination, water-quality monitoring, replacement of damaged components and other interventions designed to improve service reliability. UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Mid-Year Situation Report 2026 — United Nations Children’s Fund — August 2026.

These figures provide important evidence that infrastructure restoration remains possible in some areas despite severe insecurity. They do not establish that every recipient enjoys uninterrupted daily service or that restored facilities are immune to future damage. The figures also contain overlapping programme categories and must not be added to generate a unique beneficiary total.

The strategic importance of solarisation and other measures that reduce dependence on fuel lies in their potential to strengthen operational resilience. Where a water facility can function with less reliance on vulnerable fuel supply chains, one source of disruption may be reduced. Nevertheless, solar systems introduce their own requirements for maintenance, security, spare parts and competent technicians.

Resilience should therefore not be confused with technological independence. Every infrastructure solution remains dependent upon a functioning chain of finance, personnel, maintenance and physical protection.

The most effective reconstruction strategies are those that reduce exposure to single points of failure and establish realistic arrangements for continuing service. This may involve decentralised capacity, alternative sources of power, protection of essential components and better planning for emergency operation. The specific combination must reflect local technical and financial conditions rather than a uniform national template.

Table 3.4 — UNICEF’s Verified Mid-Year 2026 Infrastructure and Humanitarian Response

Programme indicator	Reported value	Reference period	Definition and limitation
People provided access to safe water	6.6 million	January–June 2026	UNICEF and partner WASH response; not a measure of uninterrupted national access
People reached through urban water-facility rehabilitation and construction	2.2 million	January–June 2026	Included within the wider water response
Urban water facilities constructed or rehabilitated	120	January–June 2026	Count of supported facilities, not equivalent to national functional capacity
People benefiting from emergency water chlorination and monitoring	4.4 million	January–June 2026	Included within the overall water response
People benefiting from restored Nyala water infrastructure	Approximately 600,000	Reported in mid-year 2026 assessment	Included within relevant WASH programme totals
Children screened for acute malnutrition	5.3 million	January–June 2026	Screening contacts or programme reporting; not a prevalence estimate
Children treated for severe acute malnutrition	174,700	January–June 2026	Programme treatment output
People reached with primary healthcare	1.3 million	January–June 2026	UNICEF-supported health-service reach
Children reached with education services	1.3 million	January–June 2026	Education programme reach, not evidence of full national school restoration
People receiving mental-health and psychosocial support	940,700	January–June 2026	Programme support indicator
Humanitarian appeal funding gap	Approximately 64%	June 2026	Funding gap against UNICEF’s 2026 appeal at the reporting date

Source: UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Mid-Year Situation Report 2026 — UNICEF — August 2026.

The programme indicators describe services with different populations, definitions and possible overlaps. They cannot be aggregated into a single measure of unique beneficiaries or interpreted as proof that the underlying national infrastructure has been fully restored.

Displacement, Return and the Limits of Territorial Recovery

Population return is frequently treated as evidence that security conditions are improving. In Sudan, however, the relationship between return movements and stabilisation is more complicated. A household may return because fighting has declined in one area, because living conditions at a displacement site have become unsustainable, because family or property obligations require its presence, or because economic resources no longer permit continued displacement.

The movement of people back to their areas of origin does not, by itself, establish that return is sustainable, safe or voluntary under acceptable conditions.

UNICEF’s mid-year 2026 assessment reported that more than 4.4 million people had returned, principally to Khartoum and Al Jazirah, while more than 8.8 million remained internally displaced according to the displacement figures cited in the report. It also stated that the national displacement total had declined by approximately 21%, while renewed violence in Darfur, Kordofan and Blue Nile had generated further population movements. UNICEF Sudan Humanitarian Mid-Year Situation Report 2026 — August 2026.

These figures describe a situation of simultaneous return and continued insecurity. Their coexistence is not contradictory. A country can experience substantial movement back into some urban centres while other regions generate new displacement, and some households may return more than once after repeated episodes of insecurity.

The sustainability of return depends upon several conditions that are not captured by the movement count. Housing must be accessible and sufficiently safe; essential services must function; livelihoods must be recoverable; property disputes must be manageable; and people must be protected from arbitrary violence, coercion or discrimination.

The presence of explosive remnants of war creates an additional obstacle. Roads, residential areas, public buildings and agricultural land may remain dangerous after ground forces withdraw. Even where direct fighting has ceased, the inability to verify the safety of homes and public spaces can limit the restoration of ordinary civilian activity.

Property documentation is another important consideration. Families returning after years of displacement may face missing records, damaged buildings, contested ownership or the occupation of property by others. These problems can weaken confidence in national institutions and generate disputes that persist beyond the military phase of the conflict.

Economic recovery is equally important. A household may regain physical access to a home but remain unable to finance food, healthcare or education if employment and markets have not recovered. Sustainable return therefore requires a functioning local economy as well as an acceptable security environment.

For national planning, the relevant distinction is between physical return, functional reintegration and durable recovery.

Physical return describes movement into an area. Functional reintegration requires access to basic services, livelihood opportunities and legal protection. Durable recovery requires those conditions to continue without recurrent displacement or dependence on unsustainable emergency arrangements.

Table 3.5 — Return and Reintegration: Indicators Beyond Population Movement

Assessment dimension	Minimum observable evidence	Strategic significance	Limitation of return counts
Physical return	Verified movement back to an area of origin	Indicates population mobility and potential restoration of community presence	Does not establish safety or permanence
Residential security	Accessible housing and acceptable protection conditions	Supports the ability of households to remain	Return may occur despite damaged or unsafe housing
Water and sanitation	Reliable access to safe drinking water and functional sanitation	Determines basic habitability	Population presence does not establish service access
Healthcare	Accessible and functioning medical services	Supports survival and management of disease	Reopening facilities does not guarantee availability of treatment
Education	Schools operating with teachers and necessary facilities	Supports social recovery and child protection	School buildings may exist without functioning education
Livelihood recovery	Employment, agricultural activity or sustainable household income	Reduces dependence on emergency assistance	Households may return because displacement is economically unsustainable
Property and legal protection	Accessible administrative records and functioning dispute mechanisms	Reduces conflict over housing and land	Physical occupation does not establish uncontested legal ownership
Freedom from recurrent displacement	Sustained residence without renewed forced movement	Indicates durable recovery	A one-time return figure cannot measure future security
Community inclusion	Protection against retaliation and discrimination	Supports confidence in public authority	Territorial control does not establish equal protection

The framework reflects the obstacles to sustainable return identified in the UNICEF Mid-Year 2026 Humanitarian Assessment and the wider public-health risks described in the WHO Sudan Public Health Situation Analysis — 2026.

Food Insecurity, Public Health and the Compounding Effects of Infrastructure Destruction

Sudan’s food crisis illustrates how military violence, economic collapse, displacement and the disruption of essential infrastructure can reinforce one another. Agricultural output depends on access to land, water, energy, labour, equipment and transport. Food availability depends not only on production but also on markets, storage, purchasing power and the ability of humanitarian organisations to deliver assistance where commercial systems have failed.

The destruction of a transport connection may restrict food distribution without directly reducing agricultural production. The interruption of electricity may affect irrigation or refrigeration. Displacement may prevent cultivation or harvesting. Insecurity may discourage traders from entering particular markets, while the closure of health facilities increases the consequences of malnutrition and disease.

These mechanisms are distinct but interconnected. Their interaction means that improvements in one sector may not produce sufficient recovery when other dependencies remain unresolved.

The 12 October 2026 warning issued through the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification and communicated by the World Health Organization identified renewed concerns over food insecurity and acute malnutrition, particularly in conflict-affected areas of Kordofan. WHO stressed the importance of protecting food, water and health systems, ensuring sustained humanitarian access and increasing the predictability of assistance. The organisation also reported that its own humanitarian appeal of US$97.7 million was only 23% funded at the relevant reporting date. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — World Health Organization — October 2026.

The financial shortfall has practical consequences. Programmes providing nutrition treatment, health services and disease surveillance require personnel, supplies, transportation and functioning facilities. Inadequate financing can limit programme expansion even where access is possible. Conversely, adequate financing may remain insufficient when insecurity prevents delivery.

The relevant analytical relationship is therefore between financing, access and functional capacity. All three must be present for assistance to produce durable results.

Public-health deterioration can also generate additional economic costs. Illness reduces household productivity, creates medical expenditure and places pressure on caregivers. Children affected by malnutrition may experience consequences extending beyond the immediate emergency. These effects contribute to a longer-term loss of human capital and can reduce the capacity of communities to recover economically after hostilities decline.

A reconstruction strategy concerned only with restoring physical infrastructure would consequently underestimate the damage to Sudan’s productive and social systems. Human capital, professional skills, public administration and community institutions are also essential components of economic recovery.

Children’s Security, Education and the Long-Term Institutional Consequences of Conflict

The effects of infrastructure destruction on children extend beyond immediate physical injury. Schools may close because buildings are damaged, teachers have been displaced, transport is unsafe or families cannot meet the costs of attendance. Health facilities may be unable to provide vaccinations, nutrition treatment or routine care. Water shortages can increase the time required for household survival activities and reduce children’s opportunities to attend school.

UNICEF reported on 6 July 2026 that at least 330 children had been killed or injured during the first six months of the year. In North Kordofan, attacks since May had reportedly caused more than 35 child casualties, including at least 18 children killed and more than 17 injured. UNICEF stated that drone attacks accounted for approximately 60% of those North Kordofan casualties.

The affected children ranged in age from two months to seventeen years, demonstrating that the consequences of the conflict extended across the entire childhood age range rather than being confined to adolescents exposed to particular activities. At Least 330 Children Killed or Injured in Sudan During First Six Months of 2026 — UNICEF — July 2026.

The closure of schools creates losses that are difficult to reverse quickly. Interrupted education can reduce learning progression, increase the risk of permanent disengagement and undermine the development of skills required for future economic reconstruction. The effects may become more severe when displacement interrupts attendance repeatedly or when households lose access to teachers, educational materials and safe learning facilities.

An incident in White Nile State illustrates the direct connection between aerial violence and educational disruption. On 12 March 2026, UNICEF reported that a suspected drone attack the preceding day had struck a secondary school and primary healthcare centre in Shukairi village, killing at least eight students and one health worker and injuring others. Schools in the locality were subsequently closed. UNICEF also stated that at least 200 attacks on schools and hospitals had been reported since the outbreak of the war. At Least Eight Students and a Health Worker Reportedly Killed in Attack on a School Compound — UNICEF — March 2026.

This case demonstrates two different forms of harm. The immediate casualties constitute direct violence against civilians. The subsequent school closures affect a wider population of children whose education is interrupted, including many who were not present during the attack.

The long-term economic significance is considerable. Education and healthcare are not merely social expenditures; they are foundations of the labour force, institutional competence and future productive capacity. Prolonged interruptions can reduce the number of people able to participate effectively in reconstruction, public administration and economic recovery.

Table 3.6 — Children and Essential Services: Verified Protection Indicators

Indicator	Documented value	Reference period	Consequence
Children killed or injured nationwide	At least 330	January–June 2026	Demonstrates the scale of documented direct harm
Child casualties in North Kordofan since May	More than 35	May–June 2026	Concentrated exposure in an area of intensive fighting
Children killed in the reported North Kordofan incidents	At least 18	May–June 2026	Severe mortality burden
Children injured in the reported North Kordofan incidents	More than 17	May–June 2026	Additional medical and protection requirements
North Kordofan child casualties attributed to drone attacks	Approximately 60% of the relevant reported casualties	May–June 2026	Indicates the importance of drone attacks within this particular incident set
Students killed in the Shukairi school incident	At least 8	March 2026	Direct loss of life associated with an educational facility
Health workers killed in the same incident	At least 1	March 2026	Simultaneous impact on healthcare personnel
Reported attacks affecting schools and hospitals	At least 200	Cumulative since April 2023, as reported in March 2026	Illustrates sustained attacks on essential civilian institutions

Sources: UNICEF Child Casualty Statement — July 2026; UNICEF Shukairi Incident Statement — March 2026.

The North Kordofan figures are a subset of reported national casualties, and the categories should not be added together. The percentage attributed to drone attacks concerns the specified North Kordofan incidents, not all child casualties throughout Sudan.

Territorial Fragmentation as a Crisis of Service Governance

Sudan’s division between competing military authorities creates an additional difficulty for infrastructure management: public services do not always correspond to the boundaries of military control. Electricity networks, transport corridors, water systems and commercial supply chains may connect areas administered by different authorities or affected by intermittent fighting.

This creates a form of functional territorial fragmentation, in which the geography of service delivery no longer corresponds to a coherent national administrative framework.

A water system may depend on electricity generated elsewhere. A hospital may rely on supplies entering through a distant transport hub. Agricultural markets may require access to roads crossing contested territory. Under these conditions, the interruption of a service in one region can affect populations governed by another authority.

The governance consequences are substantial. Reconstructing an installation may require agreements concerning transport, access, technical personnel, payments and public safety. Where political authority is fragmented, these arrangements may depend on temporary permissions or local negotiations rather than established national administrative procedures.

This introduces uncertainty for reconstruction financing. Donors and implementing organisations need to determine who can authorise work, who will own and operate the restored facilities, how maintenance will be financed and whether personnel can operate safely.

The absence of clear arrangements can increase transaction costs and delay reconstruction even where financial resources and technical expertise are available.

The central institutional challenge is that essential services require continuity across boundaries that the conflict has made politically and militarily unstable.

This problem cannot be resolved solely by assigning infrastructure reconstruction to a particular armed authority. Civilian facilities require accountable management, predictable financing and protection from military interference. In some locations, temporary technical arrangements may help preserve services while political negotiations continue, but such arrangements need safeguards to prevent humanitarian activities from being used to legitimise coercive governance.

The restoration of national service systems therefore becomes part of the wider problem of political reconstruction. It requires mechanisms capable of supporting cooperation across territories without presuming that the existence of a functioning administrative arrangement constitutes political recognition of an armed organisation.

Measuring the Cost of Infrastructure Warfare Without Inventing a National Damage Estimate

A rigorous assessment of Sudan’s infrastructure losses requires distinguishing several categories that are often combined in political statements.

Direct physical damage refers to the cost of replacing or repairing damaged assets. Service interruption losses concern the economic consequences of unavailable electricity, water, transport or other functions. Recovery expenditure includes emergency repairs, temporary substitutes and the resources necessary to restore operations. Long-term economic losses may arise from reduced productivity, interrupted education, lost investment and the deterioration of institutional capacity.

These categories can overlap if not defined carefully. For example, the cost of emergency water trucking is a recovery expenditure, while household expenditure on alternative supplies may form part of the economic cost of service interruption. Adding both without examining their relationship could overstate the total.

A credible national damage estimate would require asset inventories, facility condition assessments, verified dates of destruction, replacement values, price conventions, operational interruption records and appropriate adjustments for overlap.

The official sources examined establish substantial damage and disruption but do not provide a complete, reconciled national monetary valuation of all infrastructure losses attributable specifically to drone warfare. Any precise national total presented without such data would therefore be unreliable.

The most defensible approach is to identify the dimensions necessary for estimating economic consequences and preserve the difference between measured outputs and analytical mechanisms.

Table 3.7 — Framework for a Defensible National Infrastructure-Loss Assessment

Loss category	Required evidence	Appropriate unit	Principal methodological risk
Physical destruction	Verified facility inventory and damage assessments	Replacement or rehabilitation value in a specified currency and price year	Using announced reconstruction costs as verified damage values
Electricity interruption	Duration, affected demand and service records	Unserved energy, affected users and attributable economic losses	Treating all economic activity during an outage as permanently lost
Water-service interruption	Lost water output and population coverage	Cubic metres of unavailable supply and affected population	Counting emergency substitution costs twice
Healthcare disruption	Closed facilities, treatment volumes and additional patient costs	Service-days lost, treatment interruption and verifiable costs	Monetising mortality or illness without a defensible methodology
Agricultural loss	Crop type, affected area, yield and price	Hectares, production volume and monetary value	Treating affected land area as verified production loss
Transport interruption	Route availability, freight data and alternative delivery costs	Delays, additional transport expenditure and lost throughput	Attributing all regional transport costs to a single attack
Education disruption	Attendance and school-operation records	Student-days lost and service restoration costs	Converting learning loss into unsupported long-term earnings estimates
Humanitarian operational costs	Emergency logistics and programme expenditure	Verified incremental expenditure	Combining pledged funding with actual costs
Population displacement	Verified movement and household expenditure	People or households affected, with defined period	Treating all displacement as caused by infrastructure attacks
Long-term productivity	Comparable economic series and explicit counterfactual	Output loss in a defined price basis	Assuming every decline results solely from aerial warfare

This framework is intended to prevent false precision. It does not imply that every category can presently be quantified from the available official record.

The Protection of Civilian Infrastructure Under International Humanitarian Law

The protection of essential infrastructure is not merely a policy preference. It is governed by the applicable rules of international humanitarian law, which distinguish civilian objects from military objectives and regulate the conduct of attacks.

Civilian infrastructure remains protected unless the conditions required for it to qualify as a military objective are satisfied. The presence of military use does not automatically make an entire interconnected system a lawful target. An object must make an effective contribution to military action, and its destruction, capture or neutralisation must offer a definite military advantage in the circumstances ruling at the time.

Even where an object qualifies as a military objective, attacks remain subject to the rules of proportionality and precautions. The foreseeable harm to civilians includes relevant indirect consequences resulting from the loss of essential services.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has emphasised that electricity and other critical infrastructure are generally civilian objects and that the destruction of an entire network cannot be justified through broad assumptions concerning possible military use. International Humanitarian Law and the Challenges of Contemporary Armed Conflicts — International Review of the Red Cross.

Hospitals and other medical facilities benefit from specific protections, while objects indispensable to civilian survival and certain installations containing dangerous forces are subject to additional legal considerations.

The military relevance of an installation does not eliminate the requirement to assess the foreseeable civilian consequences of attacking it.

For Sudan, this principle is central because attacks affecting electricity, water, fuel and transportation may cause harm far beyond the location of physical impact. Legal assessments must therefore consider the relationships between the installation and the services upon which civilians depend.

The detailed obligations, responsibility of relevant actors and enforcement mechanisms are developed separately in Chapter 6. For the present chapter, the decisive conclusion is that infrastructure vulnerability cannot be analysed solely through the language of military utility or economic pressure.

Priority Measures for Preserving Civilian Services

The practical response to infrastructure insecurity requires a combination of civilian protection, technical recovery and institutional continuity. No single measure can guarantee resilience across a national system experiencing repeated military attacks.

The most immediate requirement is the protection of civilians and essential services from unlawful attacks, together with safe and sustained humanitarian access. Without improved security, reconstruction expenditure may be repeatedly consumed by new damage.

A second requirement is the identification of facilities whose interruption would create particularly serious consequences for civilian survival. These include critical healthcare functions, essential drinking-water systems and infrastructure necessary to maintain humanitarian assistance. Prioritisation should be based on verified service dependence, population needs and the availability of alternatives rather than the political visibility of individual projects.

A third requirement is sustainable maintenance. Repair projects must provide for qualified personnel, replacement parts, operating expenditure and monitoring. A facility whose construction is financed without provision for continued operation may restore only temporary capacity.

A fourth requirement concerns the preservation of civilian administrative records and technical knowledge. Public institutions depend on documentation, personnel and established procedures. Their loss can delay recovery even after buildings and equipment have been repaired.

Finally, humanitarian and reconstruction financing should be evaluated through service outcomes. Counts of repaired installations, delivered equipment or expenditure incurred are useful administrative indicators, but they do not establish that people have regained reliable access to the services those investments were intended to provide.

Table 3.8 — Civilian Infrastructure Protection and Recovery Priorities

Priority	Competent actors	Expected effect	Implementation burden	Main risk	Observable indicator
Protection of essential civilian facilities	Parties to the conflict under applicable law, supported by international monitoring	Reduce attacks and civilian harm	Military compliance, verification and accountability	Continued violations despite formal commitments	Verified incidents and service continuity
Restoration of drinking-water systems	Civilian service operators and humanitarian partners	Improve safe-water availability	Equipment, energy, staffing and maintenance	Repeated damage or insufficient operating resources	Reliable water output and population served
Preservation of critical healthcare	Health authorities, medical personnel and humanitarian organisations	Sustain treatment capacity	Security, medicines, staffing and infrastructure	Closure following new attacks or shortages	Functioning facilities and treatment continuity
Humanitarian transport continuity	Humanitarian agencies and relevant civilian authorities	Maintain delivery of emergency supplies	Access agreements, fuel and transport infrastructure	Route insecurity and interruptions	Verified deliveries and corridor availability
Power resilience for essential services	Competent civilian utilities and implementing partners	Reduce cascading outages	Technical design, installation and maintenance	Dependence on components that cannot be replaced	Service uptime at essential facilities
Support for sustainable return	Civilian authorities, protection agencies and service providers	Reduce repeated displacement	Housing, services and legal protection	Return without adequate safety conditions	Sustained residence and access to services
Education restoration	Education authorities, teachers and humanitarian partners	Preserve learning and child protection	Safe facilities, materials and personnel	Renewed school closures	Attendance and functioning school days
Monitoring of infrastructure damage	Competent technical and humanitarian institutions	Improve prioritisation and accountability	Consistent reporting and access	Incomplete or incompatible data	Verified facility condition and interruption records

These priorities follow the documented service disruptions and recovery requirements described by UNICEF’s Mid-Year 2026 Report, WHO’s April 2026 Health Assessment and the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator’s May 2025 Statement.

Key Judgments — Chapter 3

Civilian infrastructure insecurity is a central obstacle to Sudan’s recovery, independent of the immediate territorial balance between the belligerents. A location can return to the control of an established authority while remaining incapable of supporting ordinary civilian life because essential services have not been restored.

Electricity, water, fuel, healthcare and transportation form an interdependent system. Documented attacks show that the interruption of one component can affect several others, generating consequences whose duration and geographical reach exceed the initial physical damage.

The agricultural consequences of infrastructure failure are measurable in specific cases. The United Nations’ report of more than 84 square kilometres of crops destroyed following a prolonged electricity outage in Northern State demonstrates how energy disruption can affect production without direct attacks on agricultural land.

Sudan’s healthcare crisis has reached systemic proportions. WHO reported that 37% of facilities were nonfunctional in 2026, while verified attacks on healthcare continued to increase, undermining the capacity to respond to disease, injury and malnutrition.

Infrastructure reconstruction remains possible but must be evaluated through service continuity. UNICEF’s reported rehabilitation of 120 urban water facilities demonstrates meaningful recovery activity, while the continuing insecurity and funding gaps limit the extent to which these gains can be considered durable.

Population return is not equivalent to sustainable reintegration. Return movements coexist with renewed displacement, damaged housing, insufficient services and continuing protection risks. A durable recovery requires the restoration of functioning civilian institutions and livelihoods.

Children face consequences extending far beyond documented casualties. Attacks against schools, healthcare facilities and water systems can interrupt education and essential services, creating losses in human capital that may persist into future reconstruction periods.

What Would Change the Assessment — Chapter 3

The assessment of continued infrastructure fragmentation would weaken if verified records showed sustained restoration of electricity, safe drinking water, essential healthcare, transport and education across previously affected regions, accompanied by a substantial reduction in new attacks and repeated displacement.

Evidence of improvements would need to include functioning service capacity rather than construction expenditure alone. Reliable water output, healthcare availability, school attendance, transport accessibility and sustained population reintegration would provide more meaningful indicators than announcements of completed projects.

Conversely, repeated attacks against restored facilities, expanding healthcare closures, continued restrictions on humanitarian access and new displacement from areas experiencing partial recovery would strengthen the conclusion that Sudan’s infrastructure systems remain incapable of supporting durable stabilisation.

The most consequential outstanding records concern facility-level damage and recovery assessments, verified service-interruption data, harmonised displacement and return monitoring, infrastructure operating expenditure and independently documented progress in restoring essential public services.

Final Assessment of Chapter 3

Sudan’s infrastructure crisis is no longer adequately described as the accumulation of damaged buildings, power stations, roads and public facilities. It has become a systemic problem in which the disruption of essential services changes the economic and social conditions under which populations can survive, move, work and eventually return to normal civilian life.

The decisive feature is the interaction between military insecurity and functional dependency. Electricity failures affect water and healthcare; fuel interruptions undermine transport and emergency operations; damaged roads restrict markets and humanitarian delivery; and the loss of schools and medical facilities weakens the human and institutional resources required for eventual recovery.

These consequences are intensified by territorial fragmentation because essential infrastructure systems do not necessarily correspond to the areas controlled by individual armed organisations. Restoration therefore requires technical competence, lawful civilian administration, secure access and cooperation across a divided national environment.

The central conclusion of Chapter 3 is that military control cannot produce genuine stabilisation unless it is accompanied by the restoration of the civilian systems that make territory habitable and economically productive. Sudan’s recovery will ultimately be measured not by the number of facilities reconstructed or the volume of assistance delivered, but by whether its population can rely on essential services without recurrent disruption, coercion or displacement.

The combined analytical findings of Chapters 2 and 3 establish the fundamental transformation examined in Pillar I: unmanned warfare has expanded the geographical reach and continuity of military violence, while the destruction of interconnected civilian infrastructure has increased the economic and humanitarian consequences of that expanded reach. The result is a conflict in which military pressure can persist across extensive territory without necessarily producing decisive battlefield outcomes, and where the restoration of political authority remains inseparable from the reconstruction of civilian security.

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Chapter 4. External Powers, Military Supply Networks and the Geopolitics of Sudan

Sudan’s Internationalisation: The Emergence of a Transnational System of Military Power

The internationalisation of Sudan’s war has created a strategic environment in which the capacity of the principal belligerents to sustain military operations increasingly depends on networks of foreign suppliers, commercial intermediaries, technical specialists, financial facilitators and external political relationships. This transformation has altered the conflict’s underlying economics and diplomatic dynamics, creating a system in which national armed organisations can continue fighting despite major territorial reversals, deteriorating domestic productive capacity and mounting international pressure for a settlement. The principal strategic consequence is that military developments inside Sudan can no longer be interpreted independently of the international arrangements through which weapons, expertise, resources and political support become available.

This international dimension does not necessarily correspond to a conventional proxy war in which two clearly defined alliances exercise direct control over opposing local forces. The evidence supports a more complex configuration, characterised by overlapping commercial relationships, differing degrees of governmental involvement and procurement structures that cross jurisdictions without always reflecting an identifiable alliance between the states concerned. A weapons manufacturer may operate within one country, an intermediary may be registered in another, financial transactions may involve additional jurisdictions, and the final recipient may be an armed formation operating independently of the formal government. The geographical distribution of those activities does not establish that each government involved exercises political control over the resulting military operation.

The most important development is the emergence of a distributed military-support architecture, in which conventional defence industries, irregular recruitment networks and dual-use commercial systems can contribute to the continuation of hostilities. The architecture is distributed because its functions need not be concentrated in a single organisation or jurisdiction. Weapons procurement, financing, transportation, personnel recruitment and technical support can be performed by separate participants, making the system more difficult to interrupt through measures directed exclusively at the final recipient.

A decisive documentary example appeared on 26 June 2026, when the United States Department of the Treasury sanctioned eight individuals and entities associated with military procurement and recruitment arrangements supporting Sudan’s opposing belligerents. The enforcement action identified an industrial procurement network connected to the SAF and additional participants associated with the recruitment of foreign personnel for the RSF. In doing so, the Treasury provided evidence that the conflict’s international support system is not confined to one armed organisation or one foreign partner. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

The strategic implications are substantial. Military capability is conventionally measured through personnel, equipment, command arrangements and readiness. In Sudan, these variables remain important, but they must be assessed alongside the external relationships that enable forces to replenish materiel, access specialist knowledge and maintain operational continuity. The availability of technical support may influence whether acquired equipment remains usable, while procurement intermediaries may determine how rapidly materiel can be replaced following combat losses.

The central judgment of this chapter is that Sudan’s conflict has become internationally sustained without becoming internationally controllable. External actors can influence the military resources available to the belligerents, but there is insufficient basis to assume that those actors exercise unified command over Sudanese military organisations or possess the capacity to impose a comprehensive political settlement. This distinction explains why international pressure may coexist with continuing military escalation: the actors supplying resources, the actors exercising political influence and the actors responsible for battlefield decisions are not necessarily identical.

The United Arab Emirates: Commercial Networks, Strategic Allegations and the Limits of State Attribution

The United Arab Emirates occupies a central position in the international debate over foreign involvement in Sudan because its territory has been associated with documented commercial networks supporting the RSF, while Sudanese authorities have advanced broader allegations concerning direct Emirati governmental assistance. These are related but evidentially distinct propositions, and their separation is essential to a defensible assessment.

On 7 January 2025, the United States Treasury announced sanctions against RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, commonly known as Hemedti, together with seven companies and one individual connected to the organisation. The announcement identified Capital Tap Holding L.L.C., a company based in the United Arab Emirates, as having provided money and military equipment to the RSF. Treasury described Capital Tap Holding as a business group managing approximately 50 companies across ten countries, with associated entities involved in financial, commercial and procurement activities.

The Treasury also identified Creative Python L.L.C., another UAE-based company, as an intermediary used to conceal business transactions associated with Hemedti. According to the department, the company’s managing director handled financial transactions connected to Algoney Hamdan Dagalo Musa, identified as an RSF procurement official and a brother of the RSF leader. These findings reveal how commercial entities can become part of a military-support system without necessarily operating as conventional defence companies. Treasury Sanctions Sudanese Paramilitary Leader, Weapons Supplier, and Related Companies — U.S. Department of the Treasury — January 2025.

The organisational scale described in this enforcement action is important. A corporate group operating across multiple countries may possess access to financial institutions, commercial counterparties, international transportation arrangements and business documentation that an armed organisation cannot easily reproduce through its own military administration. Such infrastructure can facilitate the acquisition and movement of resources while complicating the identification of ultimate beneficiaries.

However, the existence of a UAE-registered commercial network supporting the RSF does not, by itself, establish that the Emirati government authorised every transaction, directed every associated activity or exercised operational command over RSF military actions. Those questions concern state attribution and require evidence beyond corporate registration, nationality or the location of a transaction.

The United Arab Emirates has repeatedly rejected Sudanese allegations of state involvement. In an official statement dated 5 August 2025, the Emirati Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied supporting armed groups in Sudan and described the allegations made by the Sudanese authorities as unfounded. This is the official position of an interested state and must be presented as such, rather than treated either as independent proof of innocence or as evidence of wrongdoing. UAE: Unfounded Allegations by Port Sudan Authority Are Baseless — Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates — August 2025.

The dispute reached the International Court of Justice when Sudan instituted proceedings against the United Arab Emirates in March 2025 under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Sudan alleged that Emirati support had contributed to acts committed by the RSF and requested provisional measures. On 5 May 2025, the Court rejected the request and ordered the case removed from its General List because it manifestly lacked jurisdiction, in light of the United Arab Emirates’ reservation to Article IX of the Genocide Convention.

The Court did not determine the merits of Sudan’s allegations. Its jurisdictional conclusion must therefore not be represented as a judicial finding that the alleged support either occurred or did not occur. This distinction is particularly consequential because the evidentiary requirements for attributing private commercial activity to a state differ from those necessary to establish that a company supplied materiel to an armed organisation. Application of the Genocide Convention in Sudan, Sudan v. United Arab Emirates, Order of 5 May 2025 — International Court of Justice — May 2025.

From a geopolitical perspective, the importance of the UAE extends beyond the immediate sanctions record. Abu Dhabi maintains significant commercial and diplomatic interests across the wider Red Sea, Horn of Africa and African economic environment. Sudan’s conflict consequently intersects with regional questions of political influence, maritime connectivity, commercial investment and relationships with competing African governments. Nevertheless, general regional interests must not be substituted for evidence of a specific military decision. The existence of an economic or diplomatic interest provides a possible strategic motive, not proof of a particular transfer or operation.

The most defensible conclusion is that documented UAE-based commercial support to the RSF creates a substantial international compliance and political-accountability issue, while the broader question of direct Emirati state responsibility remains contested. Future findings would need to distinguish private commercial activity, potential failures of regulatory oversight, deliberate governmental facilitation and direct state participation. Each category has different implications for diplomatic relations, international responsibility and possible enforcement action.

Table 4.1 — UAE-Connected Commercial Networks and the Evidentiary Distinction Between Corporate Activity and State Responsibility

Entity or institutional actor	Documented relationship	Quantitative or organisational detail	Evidentiary status	Strategic consequence
Capital Tap Holding L.L.C.	Identified by U.S. Treasury as providing money and military equipment to the RSF	Described as managing approximately 50 companies across ten countries	Official U.S. sanctions finding	Demonstrates the potential international scale of RSF-associated procurement and financial infrastructure
Capital Tap Management Consultancies L.L.C.	Identified as a UAE-based subsidiary associated with Capital Tap Holding	Part of the designated corporate network	Official U.S. sanctions finding	Illustrates the role of corporate subsidiaries in broader support structures
Capital Tap General Trading L.L.C.	Identified as a related UAE-based commercial entity	Associated with the network’s ownership and management structure	Official U.S. sanctions finding	Creates exposure through commercial relationships extending beyond conventional arms suppliers
Creative Python L.L.C.	Identified as facilitating concealment of business transactions linked to RSF leadership	Treasury described financial activity connected to the RSF procurement structure	Official U.S. sanctions finding	Demonstrates the importance of financial intermediaries and ultimate-beneficiary identification
Horizon Advanced Solutions General Trading L.L.C.	Identified as a subsidiary of Capital Tap Holding	Treasury recorded commercial imports involving an RSF-linked company	Official U.S. sanctions finding	Shows the relevance of cross-border procurement relationships
Government of the United Arab Emirates	Accused by Sudanese authorities of supporting the RSF; denies the allegations	No verified aggregate value of alleged governmental military assistance established in the cited record	Contested state-level allegation	Requires separate assessment of governmental knowledge, authorisation, control and responsibility
International Court of Justice	Considered Sudan’s case against the UAE	Case removed from the General List on 5 May 2025	Controlling judicial determination on jurisdiction, not merits	Establishes the limits of what can be concluded from the proceedings

Documentary references: U.S. Treasury Sanctions Action of 7 January 2025; Official UAE Statement of 5 August 2025; International Court of Justice, Sudan v. United Arab Emirates.

The table demonstrates why international military-support analysis must distinguish the geographic location of a business from the political responsibility of the state in which that business is registered. Failure to preserve this distinction risks producing conclusions that exceed the available evidence and may undermine the credibility of otherwise well-established procurement findings.

Iran and the Sudanese Armed Forces: Defence Relationships, Industrial Dependence and Regional Strategic Interests

Iran’s relevance to Sudan’s war arises from its defence relationships, the procurement priorities of the SAF and the broader geopolitical significance of military cooperation in the Red Sea region. The available United States official record establishes that Iranian military equipment has formed part of the SAF’s procurement environment, but it does not independently quantify the complete value, volume or operational availability of Iranian-origin equipment deployed in Sudan.

On 24 October 2024, the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Mirghani Idris Suleiman, then identified as the director general of Sudan’s Defense Industries System, for his role in obtaining weapons for the SAF. The Treasury explicitly referred to the army’s prioritisation of Iranian drones and to a prospective arrangement involving Russia and maritime access. This statement is important because it connects Sudanese procurement policy with broader international relationships, but it must be read accurately: an official description of acquisition efforts does not establish that every proposed transaction was completed or that every purchased system became operational. Treasury Sanctions Sudanese Armed Forces Weapons Procurement Director — U.S. Department of the Treasury — October 2024.

The Iranian dimension has several distinct strategic components. The first is the availability of military technology through a foreign defence relationship. The second is the possibility of sustaining that equipment through continued procurement and technical support. The third concerns the diplomatic consequences of cooperation with a state whose regional activities are already the subject of extensive international sanctions and political disputes.

Iranian-origin systems must be assessed within these separate categories. The presence of an aircraft or munition associated with a particular manufacturer does not automatically establish the date of its transfer, its immediate supplier, the conditions of any government-to-government agreement or the identity of personnel supporting its operation. These distinctions are particularly important where equipment may have been acquired during different periods, maintained through intermediaries or supplied through commercial arrangements whose full contractual terms are not public.

The strategic value of such relationships is therefore not limited to the performance characteristics of individual systems. A continuing defence relationship may provide access to maintenance services, replacement components, operational knowledge and additional procurement opportunities, while creating diplomatic costs and international financial exposure for the recipient.

Iran’s wider regional position adds another dimension. Sudan’s geographical location creates potential relevance to Red Sea security and relations among Middle Eastern and African states. Yet the presence of strategic interests should not be interpreted as evidence that Sudan has become an operational extension of Iranian regional military policy. The available official record supports an assessment of defence cooperation and associated strategic concerns, not a definitive conclusion that Tehran directs SAF operations.

A further development occurred on 12 September 2025, when the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Sudanese Islamist actors, including the Al-Baraa Bin Malik Brigade, citing connections to Iran. Treasury stated that such relationships contributed to regional instability and identified concerns over the influence of Iranian-linked networks within Sudan’s conflict. Treasury Sanctions Sudanese Islamist Actors to Counter Regional Instability and Support for Iran — U.S. Department of the Treasury — September 2025.

This finding illustrates the need to distinguish formal military procurement from wider political and armed-group relationships. Foreign influence can operate through direct equipment supply, ideological affinity, commercial intermediaries or cooperation with domestic armed organisations. These mechanisms are not interchangeable. Their political and military consequences depend on the actual resources transferred, the degree of coordination and the authority exercised over recipient organisations.

Iran’s strategic significance in Sudan therefore lies in the interaction between defence supply, Sudanese military-industrial requirements and the possibility that external relationships strengthen the operational endurance of SAF-associated forces. The scale of that contribution cannot be established solely from sanctions descriptions, and a comprehensive assessment would require verified delivery records, contracts, maintenance arrangements and evidence of operational employment.

Russia: Military Access, Defence Diplomacy and the Strategic Value of Sudan’s Red Sea Coast

Russia’s interests in Sudan reflect the country’s strategic position along the Red Sea, its military-diplomatic relationships in Africa and the potential value of maritime access for sustaining an international naval presence. These interests are analytically distinct from the specific question of whether Russia has supplied particular weapons or concluded an operational basing agreement with Sudan’s authorities.

The Red Sea connects the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal with the Indian Ocean through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. Access to facilities along this maritime corridor can provide strategic value for naval logistics, maintenance, port visits and diplomatic presence. For a state seeking to maintain influence across multiple maritime theatres, a reliable relationship with a coastal partner may reduce dependence on distant support infrastructure.

Sudan’s importance to Russia must therefore be evaluated through the distinction between access negotiations, legal agreements, construction activity and operational deployment. An announced proposal for a naval facility is not equivalent to a ratified agreement, and a ratified agreement would not automatically establish that the necessary infrastructure, personnel and operational capabilities were present.

The October 2024 U.S. Treasury announcement concerning Sudanese military procurement referred to a prospective arrangement involving Russian maritime access in exchange for weapons. This demonstrates that the relationship had become relevant to U.S. assessments of Sudan’s military procurement choices, but it does not provide a sufficient basis to conclude that the contemplated arrangements had been fully implemented. U.S. Treasury Sanctions Sudanese Armed Forces Weapons Procurement Director — October 2024.

The geopolitical implications depend on the level at which cooperation becomes operational. Diplomatic engagement and naval-access negotiations can influence political relationships without producing an immediate military transformation. The delivery of military materiel, if verified, would affect procurement options. A functioning foreign naval facility would have additional consequences for maritime logistics and regional security calculations. Each development should therefore be assessed separately.

Russia’s military relationships also intersect with the broader issue of competition among foreign suppliers. Sudanese procurement does not necessarily follow a single exclusive alliance. The presence of relationships with multiple external actors can increase bargaining flexibility for Sudanese authorities while complicating the positions of states seeking to reduce foreign military assistance.

This creates an important strategic asymmetry. International actors attempting to restrict the supply of military equipment may face the possibility that affected organisations seek alternative suppliers or intermediaries. However, the ease of substitution depends on technical compatibility, financing, delivery capacity and political willingness, none of which should be presumed.

Russia’s principal geopolitical stake is Sudan’s potential value as a defence and maritime partner, rather than any demonstrated ability to determine the outcome of the Sudanese conflict. The decisive future indicators are formal legal commitments, evidence of completed military transfers, development of operational port infrastructure and verified changes in Russian military presence.

Turkey and China: Competing Defence-Industrial Ecosystems and the Geopolitics of Military Technology

Turkey and China occupy a different position from the Gulf and Iranian dimensions because their strategic relevance to Sudan includes their roles as established manufacturers and exporters of military equipment. The international circulation of their systems creates questions concerning technology dependence, military procurement, export authorisation and the ability of recipient organisations to maintain acquired equipment over time. These questions require a distinction between the origin of a weapon system, the jurisdiction of the company producing it, the state authorising an export and the ultimate military organisation operating the equipment.

A Chinese-manufactured system appearing in an armed conflict is not, by itself, evidence that the Chinese government supplied it directly to the recipient or exercises control over its employment. The same principle applies to Turkish-manufactured military equipment. Establishing the complete chain of supply requires documentation capable of identifying the original transaction, subsequent ownership, intermediary transfers and the final recipient. The distinction becomes especially important where equipment can be transferred through third countries, acquired through commercial intermediaries or diverted after an authorised transaction.

The defence-industrial relationship nevertheless has geopolitical significance because the ability to procure, maintain and adapt advanced military equipment can create continuing relationships between suppliers and recipients. Equipment that depends upon specialised components, proprietary maintenance systems, training or technical assistance may generate long-term logistical dependencies. These dependencies can influence the foreign-policy choices of recipient governments and create commercial opportunities or regulatory responsibilities for suppliers.

For Turkey, the analytical significance lies in the interaction between its defence-export industry, relationships with African governments and its position within the wider Euro-Atlantic security system. Turkish companies have become important participants in the international market for unmanned systems, but the acquisition of Turkish-manufactured equipment does not establish that the Turkish state has assumed responsibility for the military strategy of the purchasing government. Defence exports may reflect commercial transactions, bilateral security cooperation or broader diplomatic relationships, and the available public record must establish which mechanism applies to a particular transfer.

The June 2026 U.S. Treasury enforcement action documented one concrete Turkish commercial connection with Sudan’s military procurement environment. The department stated that Ports Engineering Company Ltd., a Sudanese public construction company associated with state-owned enterprises, had imported ammunition belts and boxes of weapons from a Turkish company after the outbreak of the conflict. This supports the conclusion that Turkish commercial supply relationships formed part of the documented procurement environment, but the specific announcement does not establish a comprehensive inventory of Turkish military transfers to Sudan or identify every item used in combat. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

China’s significance is similarly multidimensional. It is a major international industrial power with established defence-manufacturing capabilities, extensive commercial relationships across Africa and an interest in protecting its economic and diplomatic position in the region. These considerations make the proliferation of Chinese-origin military technology strategically relevant, particularly when equipment appears in conflicts involving non-state formations. However, claims concerning specific Chinese systems in Sudan require independent verification of their identification, provenance and transfer history.

The distinction between manufacturing origin and transfer responsibility is essential. A weapons system may pass through multiple jurisdictions during its operational life. An original export may have been authorised for one recipient before a subsequent transfer occurred. Alternatively, a system may have entered the market through a commercial relationship that is not fully documented in the public record. Consequently, manufacturer identification should be treated as the beginning of an investigation into supply provenance, not as the final determination of state responsibility.

The wider competition between Turkish and Chinese defence-industrial ecosystems may influence procurement choices, maintenance relationships and the diffusion of technical expertise. Nevertheless, Sudan should not automatically be interpreted as a centrally directed contest between Ankara and Beijing. Such an interpretation would require evidence that the two governments were deliberately coordinating opposing military strategies or using the conflict to pursue an organised bilateral confrontation. The documented procurement environment supports a narrower and more defensible assessment: Sudan is a conflict in which internationally manufactured military technologies and support systems have become strategically relevant, while the degree of governmental involvement differs by supplier, transaction and recipient.

This distinction matters because the policy instruments available to governments depend on the nature of the relationship. Where a direct authorised export is documented, the exporting state may possess regulatory mechanisms concerning licensing and subsequent transactions. Where equipment has been diverted through intermediaries, enforcement may depend more heavily on tracing commercial relationships and identifying those responsible for subsequent transfers. Where operational support is provided by private personnel, export controls alone may not address the complete activity.

Table 4.2 — Comparative Assessment of External Defence Relationships

External actor	Established or officially reported connection	Principal strategic interest	Evidentiary limitation	Consequence for Sudan
United Arab Emirates	U.S. sanctions findings concerning UAE-based commercial entities supporting RSF procurement and financing	Regional political influence, commercial relationships and security interests	Corporate activity does not alone establish direct governmental command or responsibility	International financial and procurement relationships associated with RSF military endurance
Iran	U.S. Treasury reporting concerning SAF acquisition priorities, including Iranian drones, and connections with Sudanese Islamist actors	Defence cooperation and broader regional political interests	Complete delivery volumes and operational availability are not established	Additional potential military supply relationships and political dependencies
Russia	Official U.S. reference to a prospective maritime-access arrangement connected to weapons procurement	Red Sea access, defence diplomacy and strategic presence	Proposed arrangements must be distinguished from implemented agreements and deployed capabilities	Possible linkage between military procurement and maritime diplomacy
Turkey	Documented Turkish commercial supply connection involving Sudanese military procurement	Defence exports, bilateral relationships and African commercial presence	The cited enforcement record does not establish the entire transfer history	Potential industrial and procurement dependencies
China	Relevant defence-industrial manufacturing capacity and international export role	Commercial and diplomatic interests and protection of export relationships	Specific transfers, diversion pathways and ultimate recipients require transaction-level verification	Importance of equipment provenance and transfer governance
Colombia-connected private networks	U.S. Treasury documented recruitment of former Colombian military personnel for RSF operations	Commercial recruitment activity by private individuals and companies	Private recruitment does not establish Colombian governmental sponsorship	Access to foreign combat and technical expertise
United States	Sanctions enforcement directed at procurement, recruitment and leadership networks associated with both belligerents	Conflict de-escalation, regional security and sanctions compliance	Enforcement measures do not establish that military supply has ceased	Financial pressure on documented facilitators and increased compliance exposure

Sources: U.S. Treasury, Sudanese Armed Forces Weapons Procurement Director — October 2024; U.S. Treasury, RSF Leadership and Weapons Supplier — January 2025; U.S. Treasury, Foreign Recruitment Network — December 2025; U.S. Treasury, Procurement and Recruitment Networks — June 2026.

The table demonstrates that external involvement cannot be reduced to a uniform category of military sponsorship. In some cases, the evidence concerns directly identified procurement entities; in others, it concerns defence diplomacy, official allegations, commercial transactions or the broader strategic interests of foreign states. Maintaining these distinctions is necessary to avoid converting industrial origin, commercial activity or geopolitical interest into unsupported claims of governmental command.

Foreign Military Personnel and the Emergence of a Commercial Market for Combat Expertise

The recruitment of foreign military personnel constitutes one of the most consequential and concretely documented aspects of Sudan’s internationalisation. Unlike general assumptions about foreign influence, the U.S. Treasury’s December 2025 and April 2026 enforcement actions identified specific people, companies, commercial functions and recruitment relationships supporting the deployment of former Colombian military personnel to fight for the RSF.

The December 2025 announcement stated that hundreds of former Colombian military personnel had travelled to Sudan since September 2024, providing tactical and technical expertise in several roles, including infantry, artillery, vehicle operation, military instruction and drone operation. Treasury connected their activities to combat in Khartoum, Omdurman, Kordofan and El Fasher. The department also identified personnel involved in training RSF recruits, including children, making clear that the significance of the network extended beyond the direct participation of foreign combatants. Treasury Sanctions Transnational Network Recruiting Colombians to Fight in Sudan’s Civil War — U.S. Department of the Treasury — December 2025.

The significance of these findings is not merely numerical. Even hundreds of foreign military personnel would not necessarily determine the overall balance between armed organisations operating across Sudan’s extensive territory. Their potentially disproportionate contribution lies in specialised skills, familiarity with organised military procedures and the capacity to perform functions that may be difficult to reproduce rapidly through local recruitment.

The strategic value of foreign military specialists depends less on their share of total personnel than on the military functions they perform and their ability to transfer knowledge to existing formations. An organisation that acquires trained instructors, communications personnel or operators of specialised systems may improve particular capabilities without dramatically increasing its overall manpower. Conversely, foreign personnel can be difficult to integrate, may require separate financing and can introduce additional command, language and accountability problems.

The Treasury identified Alvaro Andres Quijano Becerra, a retired Colombian military officer based in the United Arab Emirates, as a central participant in the recruitment structure. It described International Services Agency (A4SI), based in Colombia, as an important recruitment organisation, while Global Staffing S.A., subsequently renamed Talent Bridge S.A., operated from Panama and performed intermediary functions intended, according to Treasury, to obscure relationships between recruiters and the ultimate hiring organisation.

The department also identified Maine Global Corp S.A.S., based in Colombia, as participating in the management and distribution of funds associated with the recruitment network. According to Treasury, companies linked to the network processed payments, conducted foreign-exchange transactions and transferred funds across jurisdictions. U.S.-based companies associated with one participant were reported to have engaged in wire transfers totalling millions of U.S. dollars during 2024 and 2025. The announcement did not establish a complete audited cost of the foreign recruitment programme, and the reported transfers should not be interpreted as the total value of all military personnel services supplied to the RSF. Treasury Sanctions Transnational Network Recruiting Colombians to Fight in Sudan’s Civil War — U.S. Department of the Treasury — December 2025.

The distinction between recruitment, contractual intermediation and payroll administration is especially important. These functions can be located in different jurisdictions, creating a system in which the employer, recruiter, financial intermediary and final military beneficiary may not appear in a single commercial transaction. The resulting fragmentation complicates the ability of financial institutions and enforcement agencies to establish the ultimate purpose of payments or services.

The April 2026 enforcement action demonstrated the adaptability of this structure. Treasury sanctioned additional participants, including Fénix Human Resources S.A.S., which it described as having been established in February 2025 as a successor recruitment vehicle to A4SI, together with additional recruiters connected to the placement of former Colombian military personnel. The department identified arrangements through which recruitment continued despite the international scrutiny associated with earlier networks. Treasury Sanctions Recruitment Network Enabling War in Sudan, Calls for Humanitarian Truce — U.S. Department of the Treasury — April 2026.

This sequence illustrates a broader vulnerability in international enforcement. The designation of a company may restrict its access to particular financial systems, but it does not automatically eliminate the knowledge, personal relationships or market demand that enabled the company to operate. Individuals may establish replacement entities, change contractual arrangements or attempt to shift financial activity to other intermediaries. Whether such adaptation succeeds must be established through subsequent evidence rather than assumed.

The June 2026 action added further information concerning the individuals involved in the Panama-based corporate structure. Treasury identified former directors and officers associated with Talent Bridge and described changes in the company’s management and name. The enforcement sequence therefore reveals a recruitment structure that authorities investigated through its corporate organisation, personnel, financial relationships and subsequent adaptation.

The analytical importance is that foreign military recruitment has become a service market capable of connecting experienced personnel to an armed organisation through internationally distributed business arrangements. This development raises questions extending beyond Sudan. It concerns the ability of states to supervise military-service recruitment, the use of ordinary corporate and financial infrastructure for armed conflict, and the possibility that experienced personnel could later transfer their expertise into other wars.

Table 4.3 — Documented Foreign Military Recruitment and Commercial Intermediation

Date of official action	Documented finding	Quantitative evidence	Network function	Strategic significance
9 December 2025	Four individuals and four entities designated in connection with recruitment for the RSF	8 designations in the action	Recruitment, corporate intermediation and associated financial activity	Established a detailed official record of the foreign personnel network
December 2025 findings	Former Colombian military personnel had travelled to Sudan since September 2024	Hundreds of personnel	Combat, instruction and specialised military support	Demonstrated access to experienced foreign personnel
December 2025 findings	Recruitment targeted specialised functions	Drone operators, snipers and translators among the recruited roles	Skills-based personnel acquisition	Suggests capability augmentation beyond general manpower recruitment
December 2025 findings	Financial activity linked companies across jurisdictions	Millions of U.S. dollars in identified wire transfers during 2024–2025	Payroll, financial intermediation and currency conversion	Demonstrates the financial infrastructure supporting recruitment
17 April 2026	Additional recruiters and replacement entities sanctioned	5 individuals and entities	Continuation and adaptation of recruitment structures	Shows that enforcement must address successor organisations and associated individuals
26 June 2026	Additional network participants sanctioned	8 total designations across SAF procurement and RSF recruitment networks	Corporate control, supply and recruitment services	Demonstrates the simultaneous relevance of military procurement and foreign personnel services

Sources: U.S. Treasury, December 2025; U.S. Treasury, April 2026; U.S. Treasury, June 2026.

The figures should not be combined into a purported total number of distinct foreign combatants or unique corporate participants. The designations relate to different actions and may involve related individuals or successor organisations, while the description of hundreds of personnel does not provide a complete, independently audited recruitment database.

The Sudanese Defence-Industrial System and the International Procurement Dependence of the SAF

The SAF’s international military supply relationships must be assessed in conjunction with Sudan’s domestic defence-industrial organisations. Foreign military equipment does not enter the conflict through an institutional vacuum: it may be procured, financed, maintained or distributed through companies connected to national military structures and associated industrial enterprises.

The U.S. Treasury has identified the Defense Industries System (DIS) as a central component of this structure. The department sanctioned DIS in June 2023 and subsequently described its role in supporting the army’s military procurement and industrial activities. In its June 2026 enforcement action, Treasury identified DIS as Sudan’s largest defence enterprise and stated that it controlled numerous subsidiaries, including Giad Industrial Group, also known as Sudan Master Technology.

Treasury described the structure as involving complex and opaque corporate arrangements and stated that DIS had generated billions of dollars through its business activities. This establishes the importance of an industrial and commercial system extending beyond the direct procurement of individual weapons. However, the reported aggregate should not be interpreted as a verified annual military budget, the value of combat equipment acquired during the war or the amount spent on any particular technological programme. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

The June 2026 action identified Target Multiactivities Company Ltd. (TMAC) as a Sudan-based enterprise controlled through the DIS–Giad structure. According to Treasury, TMAC had imported explosives and related materials from companies in Egypt and India, including SBL Energy Limited, an Indian explosives manufacturer. The department stated that SBL had supplied more than 200 shipments of explosives and explosives-related materials since 2024.

This is one of the most significant quantitative findings in the official procurement record because it documents a repeated supply relationship rather than an isolated transaction. Nevertheless, the number of shipments cannot be converted into a reliable tonnage, financial value or number of completed munitions without access to verified cargo manifests and transaction records. A shipment may contain differing quantities and types of material, and the existence of an import does not establish that every item was subsequently converted into a specific weapon.

The Treasury also identified Ports Engineering Company Ltd., a Sudanese public construction enterprise owned by state-associated companies, as having imported military-related supplies from foreign firms. The department described shipments involving uniforms and footwear from an Emirati company and ammunition belts and boxes of weapons from a Turkish company.

These findings demonstrate that the procurement system is not confined to entities that are publicly identified as defence manufacturers. Construction companies, industrial conglomerates, trading enterprises and specialised suppliers may become relevant to military supply chains through the nature of the goods they acquire or the institutions that control them.

The principal strategic consequence is that the SAF possesses access to a military-industrial structure whose international relationships can contribute to sustained procurement. At the same time, dependence on foreign suppliers creates exposure to regulatory measures, transaction restrictions, transportation disruptions and the availability of specialised industrial inputs.

The existence of a domestic defence-industrial organisation does not establish complete military self-sufficiency. A national enterprise may produce or maintain some categories of equipment while relying on imports for critical components, raw materials, machinery or finished products. Determining the degree of self-sufficiency requires evidence of actual manufacturing output, supply-chain dependencies and operational availability.

Table 4.4 — SAF-Associated Industrial Procurement: Verified Entities and Quantities

Entity	Location or institutional connection	Documented activity	Quantitative record	Principal analytical implication
Defense Industries System	Sudanese military-associated enterprise	Procurement, maintenance and industrial support for SAF	Treasury reported business activity generating billions of dollars through associated structures	Central institution in the army’s defence-industrial environment
Giad Industrial Group	Sudanese industrial conglomerate controlled within the DIS structure	Industrial and commercial activities associated with military procurement	No complete verified wartime production total in the cited action	Illustrates the relationship between military industry and diversified commercial enterprises
Target Multiactivities Company Ltd.	Sudan-based company controlled through DIS/Giad	Importation of explosives and related materials	Exact total imports not specified in the cited record	Identified procurement intermediary
SBL Energy Limited	India-based manufacturer	Supply of explosives and related materials to TMAC	More than 200 shipments since 2024	Evidence of repeated international procurement activity
Tariq Hussain Muhammad Madani	Senior DIS-associated official and TMAC managing director	Corporate leadership of an identified procurement organisation	No complete transaction value specified	Importance of responsible managers within procurement structures
Ports Engineering Company Ltd.	Sudanese state-associated construction company	Importation of uniforms, footwear and military-related goods	Individual shipment values not comprehensively specified	Demonstrates the relevance of nontraditional commercial enterprises
Egyptian suppliers	Companies in Egypt identified in Treasury’s procurement description	Explosives-related commercial supplies	No complete independently reconciled total	Establishes the presence of an Egyptian commercial connection without proving Egyptian governmental direction
Turkish supplier	Company identified through Ports Engineering procurement	Ammunition belts and boxes of weapons	Total contract value not established	Indicates a Turkish commercial connection requiring transaction-specific analysis

Source: Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

This evidence reveals a key structural characteristic of modern armed conflict: procurement capability can depend as much on the organisation of industrial and commercial relationships as on the possession of conventional military formations. For Sudan, it also means that military supply cannot be assessed by treating the formal national economy and the military economy as entirely separate systems.

The Geopolitical Consequences of Foreign Supply Competition: Diversification, Dependency and Strategic Bargaining

The existence of multiple foreign military relationships creates a geopolitical environment in which the belligerents may seek to reduce dependence on any single external supplier. This tendency should not be interpreted as evidence that every foreign relationship is interchangeable. Military equipment differs in technical compatibility, training requirements, maintenance arrangements and financing conditions, while governments and commercial suppliers operate under different legal restrictions and political priorities.

Diversification may increase procurement resilience while simultaneously multiplying logistical complexity. An organisation able to approach several suppliers may have more opportunities to obtain equipment when one source becomes unavailable, but the acquisition of systems from different industrial ecosystems can increase the number of specialised components, technical procedures and support arrangements required to maintain an effective military force.

This creates a possible contradiction between short-term acquisition and long-term sustainability. A military organisation may improve its immediate capabilities by obtaining additional equipment from a new supplier, yet become more dependent on external specialists or fragmented maintenance arrangements. These dependencies can become consequential when international sanctions, political disagreements or transportation disruptions affect the supply of critical materials.

Foreign governments may also acquire diplomatic influence through continuing supply relationships, although the existence and strength of such influence must be demonstrated rather than assumed. A supplier that controls essential maintenance, training or replacement equipment could potentially affect the recipient’s operational sustainability. Conversely, a recipient possessing alternative suppliers or sufficient domestic stocks may retain considerable freedom of action.

The result is a system of asymmetric mutual dependence. Sudanese armed organisations may rely on foreign relationships for military resources, while foreign suppliers and intermediaries may derive commercial or strategic advantages from maintaining access to Sudanese institutions. The balance between these interests influences whether external actors are willing to support de-escalation and whether procurement restrictions can change battlefield incentives.

The international record also shows that the involvement of companies from several jurisdictions does not establish a coherent geopolitical alliance among their governments. The June 2026 Treasury findings concerning Indian, Egyptian, Turkish and Emirati commercial connections with SAF-associated procurement illustrate this distinction. Firms operating from different countries can become part of the same supply environment without their home governments necessarily sharing a common policy towards Sudan.

This requires a more sophisticated interpretation of foreign influence than an exclusive division between supporters of the SAF and supporters of the RSF. The decisive questions concern the specific goods or services provided, the financial and contractual relationships involved, the authority of governments over those activities, and whether support can continue after political or regulatory intervention.

Table 4.5 — Foreign Military Support: Dependency and Strategic Leverage

Support function	Benefit to recipient	Potential influence of external provider	Constraint on external leverage	Policy significance
Conventional military equipment	Replenishment of materiel and expansion of available capabilities	Control over further authorised deliveries	Existing stocks and alternative procurement sources	Export restrictions may affect future acquisitions without immediately eliminating existing capabilities
Specialised equipment maintenance	Preservation of operational availability	Access to replacement components and technical support	Local repair capacity and compatibility with other suppliers	Maintenance relationships can create longer-term dependence
Foreign combat specialists	Access to trained personnel and specialised knowledge	Continued recruitment and contractual arrangements	Integration difficulties and the ability to train local replacements	Financial and recruitment enforcement may affect critical services
Industrial inputs	Support for domestic production or maintenance	Access to raw materials, machinery and specialised components	Substitution and domestic inventories	Controls may affect production over time rather than immediately
Corporate procurement services	Access to international commercial transactions	Contractual and financial access	Ability to establish alternative intermediaries	Beneficial-ownership and transaction transparency are important
Financial intermediation	Payment, currency conversion and commercial settlement	Access to particular financial institutions and currencies	Alternative settlement channels	Financial measures require international coordination
Diplomatic recognition and political engagement	Political visibility and opportunities for negotiation	International legitimacy and access to institutions	Recipient autonomy and competing diplomatic relationships	Diplomatic influence cannot be equated with military command
Maritime or infrastructure access	Potential logistical and commercial cooperation	Rights associated with formally agreed access arrangements	Legal implementation, infrastructure and host-state decisions	Announced proposals must be distinguished from operational facilities

The comparison is an analytical assessment derived from the documented procurement and recruitment mechanisms in U.S. Treasury’s December 2025 Enforcement Action and June 2026 Enforcement Action. It does not assign unsupported numerical values to external leverage or operational dependency.

International Enforcement and the Problem of Network Substitution

The sanctions actions taken between 2023 and 2026 reveal a progressive expansion in the categories of actors identified as contributing to Sudan’s war. Enforcement initially concentrated on military-associated companies and leadership structures, subsequently expanding to procurement officials, external suppliers, foreign recruitment organisations and individuals exercising corporate control.

On 1 June 2023, the U.S. Treasury sanctioned companies associated with both sides of the conflict, including the SAF-linked Defense Industries System and RSF-associated commercial enterprises. This action established that the economic foundations of the conflict included companies operating beyond conventional battlefield structures. Treasury specifically identified Al Junaid Multi Activities Co Ltd., controlled by members of the Dagalo family, as a diversified company involved in several sectors, including gold mining. It also identified Tradive General Trading L.L.C., based in the UAE, as an RSF-associated procurement company. Treasury Sanctions Military-Affiliated Companies Fueling Both Sides of the Conflict in Sudan — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2023.

The subsequent enforcement sequence demonstrates a progression from identifying military-linked corporate structures towards examining specific international functions. The October 2024 action concerned SAF weapons procurement leadership. The January 2025 action targeted RSF leadership and associated commercial suppliers. The December 2025 and April 2026 measures addressed foreign recruitment organisations. The June 2026 action combined industrial procurement and foreign personnel networks in a single enforcement announcement.

This progression is analytically significant because it shows that the international military-support system cannot be adequately represented by a list of sanctioned commanders or arms manufacturers. The relevant network includes people and companies whose commercial activities may appear ordinary until their relationship with the ultimate military beneficiary is established.

However, the number of designations does not establish the effectiveness of enforcement. A sanctions announcement records a legal and administrative measure, not necessarily the complete interruption of a supply chain. The practical consequences depend on whether the designated individuals or companies lose access to necessary resources and whether alternative organisations can provide equivalent services.

The replacement of recruitment structures documented in the April 2026 Treasury announcement is particularly relevant. It shows how corporate adaptation can become part of the response to scrutiny. The establishment of successor entities or the transfer of recruitment activity between organisations creates challenges for enforcement authorities because restrictions directed at one corporate structure may not immediately eliminate the personnel, professional relationships or commercial demand sustaining the activity.

These dynamics also create a distinction between transaction disruption and capability disruption. Preventing a particular transaction may be an immediate enforcement success, but its military significance depends on whether the recipient can substitute another source, use existing inventories or maintain operations without the affected service.

A defensible evaluation of sanctions effectiveness must therefore examine changes in actual procurement and recruitment, rather than treating successive designations as evidence that a growing proportion of the war economy has necessarily been disabled.

Table 4.6 — International Enforcement Actions and Their Implications for Military Support Networks

Date	U.S. enforcement focus	Quantitative or institutional evidence	Support function addressed	Limitation of the measure
1 June 2023	Military-affiliated commercial enterprises on opposing sides	DIS, Al Junaid and other companies identified	Military industry, commercial resources and procurement	Corporate designations do not establish the elimination of underlying supply
24 October 2024	SAF procurement leadership	Mirghani Idris Suleiman designated	Weapons acquisition and military-industrial management	Does not establish cancellation of every existing procurement relationship
7 January 2025	RSF leadership and associated commercial companies	Seven companies and one individual designated alongside RSF leader Hemedti	RSF financing and equipment supply	Requires continuing investigation of associated and replacement structures
16 January 2025	SAF leadership and procurement participants	SAF leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and procurement-related actors targeted	Leadership accountability and supply	Does not itself establish changes in military command or operational capability
9 December 2025	Foreign military recruitment	Four individuals and four entities designated	Recruitment, contractual arrangements and financial services	Technical expertise may persist after individual entities are sanctioned
17 April 2026	Additional recruitment entities and individuals	Five individuals and entities designated	Successor recruitment organisations and associated personnel	Organisational adaptation can complicate enforcement
26 June 2026	SAF procurement and RSF recruitment networks	Eight individuals and entities designated	Industrial supply, explosives, commercial intermediation and recruitment	Effectiveness depends on actual disruption and the prevention of substitution

Sources: U.S. Treasury, June 2023; October 2024; January 2025 — RSF; January 2025 — SAF; December 2025; April 2026; June 2026.

These actions are separate enforcement events. The quantities should not be added to generate a unique total of sanctioned people or organisations without reconciling corporate relationships, associated individuals and any overlapping records.

The European and Transatlantic Implications of Sudan’s External Military Networks

The internationalisation of Sudan’s military supply system creates obligations and strategic challenges for European governments even where they are not directly involved in the conflict. These challenges arise through financial systems, export-control responsibilities, commercial supply chains, the movement of foreign military personnel and diplomatic relationships with states whose companies or institutions appear in the procurement record.

For Italy, the relevance of Sudan’s international networks lies in the intersection of Mediterranean security, industrial compliance and relationships with African and Middle Eastern partners. Italian authorities and companies must distinguish ordinary commercial transactions from activities involving designated persons, prohibited military services or controlled equipment. The presence of internationally distributed procurement networks means that compliance cannot depend solely on identifying Sudan as the immediate destination of a transaction. Commercial arrangements involving intermediary jurisdictions may require examination of beneficial ownership, ultimate end use and applicable licensing requirements.

For France, Sudan’s internationalisation creates additional questions concerning security relationships in Africa and the implications of transnational recruitment or arms procurement structures. French interests cannot be separated from the broader stability of African security institutions, particularly where foreign military personnel and commercial intermediaries operate across borders. The existence of such networks does not establish that they are active in every neighbouring country; rather, it creates a requirement for intelligence and regulatory authorities to determine whether relationships identified in Sudan are being replicated elsewhere.

For Germany, the strongest structural connection concerns industrial export controls, financial supervision and the humanitarian consequences of continuing external military support. German authorities face the general challenge of distinguishing authorised civilian commercial activity from transactions that contribute to prohibited military procurement. This requires legal precision because the presence of a complex supply chain does not automatically establish that every associated product, service or company is subject to restrictions.

For the United Kingdom, Sudan’s foreign military support system intersects with its diplomatic role, financial markets and responsibilities associated with sanctions implementation and international security. London’s position as a major financial centre makes transparency and compliance relevant to cross-border transactions, while British diplomacy has an interest in measures capable of affecting the incentives of Sudan’s belligerents and their external facilitators.

At the collective European level, the conflict has increasingly been addressed as an issue of economic and financial support for warfare. On 13 July 2026, the Council of the European Union adopted restrictions on Sudanese-origin gold and the supply of specified substances used in gold extraction, accompanied by associated prohibitions on services. Although the detailed legal framework belongs to Chapter 6, the geopolitical significance is already evident: the European Union has moved towards measures intended to affect the economic foundations of the conflict rather than relying solely on individual designations. Sudan: Council Strengthens EU Sanctions Regime by Targeting Gold Trade — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The transatlantic challenge is one of coordination rather than simple regulatory uniformity. The United States, European Union and United Kingdom operate different legal frameworks, designation procedures and enforcement systems. Effective cooperation requires sufficient alignment to prevent known facilitators from shifting activities between jurisdictions, while preserving the applicable evidentiary thresholds, legal safeguards and humanitarian authorisations.

The relationship with Gulf states and other external partners adds political complexity. Governments may maintain important commercial, security and diplomatic relationships with countries whose territory contains businesses connected to Sudanese military procurement. As a result, enforcement directed at specific individuals or companies must be distinguished from broader measures affecting bilateral relations.

The strategic test for Europe is whether it can constrain documented military-support networks without replacing legally precise enforcement with undifferentiated political pressure against entire national economies. Measures based on identifiable transactions, controlling interests and legally established responsibilities offer a stronger foundation for sustainable implementation than assumptions derived exclusively from nationality or geographical location.

The Emerging Security Problem: International Networks That Outlast Individual Conflicts

The most serious long-term consequence of Sudan’s external military relationships may be the persistence of organisational capabilities after the immediate conflict has changed or ended. Weapons can be consumed, destroyed or surrendered, but recruitment networks, commercial relationships, military expertise and financial experience may remain available to their participants. This creates a potential form of strategic persistence that cannot be measured solely through the number of active combatants remaining on the battlefield.

The Colombian recruitment case demonstrates that experienced military personnel can be connected to a foreign conflict through corporate arrangements spanning multiple jurisdictions. The documented procurement networks demonstrate that companies operating in ordinary commercial sectors can acquire military relevance through their relationships with defence enterprises and armed organisations. Together, these findings establish the possibility of military-support infrastructure that is organisationally separable from a particular battlefront.

This does not mean that every participant will subsequently support another conflict. Nor does it establish that the same network can operate with equal effectiveness in every jurisdiction. The transferability of military services depends on future demand, the availability of financing, regulatory intervention and the willingness of individual participants to become involved.

Nevertheless, the strategic concern is well founded: the organisational experience accumulated through Sudan’s war may retain value independently of the military outcome in Sudan itself. Recruiters may acquire relationships with experienced personnel, intermediaries may develop familiarity with complex commercial arrangements, and military specialists may retain knowledge gained through operations. The persistence of such assets creates a potential security issue for states seeking to prevent the spread of foreign military recruitment and illicit procurement structures.

The distinction between the end of a conflict and the dismantling of its supporting networks is therefore critical. A negotiated settlement might reduce immediate demand for military supplies, but it would not automatically dissolve every company, terminate every contractual relationship or eliminate the expertise accumulated by participants. Effective post-conflict stabilisation may consequently require attention to demobilisation, lawful employment alternatives, financial transparency and the restructuring of military-associated commercial enterprises.

Key Judgments

First, Sudan’s internationalisation is structurally distributed rather than organised through a single, fully identifiable foreign command system. The record establishes procurement and recruitment relationships involving multiple jurisdictions, but it does not justify treating every transaction as evidence of state-directed military intervention.

Second, the documented involvement of UAE-based companies in RSF financing and military supply is significant, while allegations of direct Emirati governmental responsibility remain a separate and contested question. The International Court of Justice’s May 2025 jurisdictional ruling did not adjudicate the underlying merits.

Third, the SAF’s procurement environment includes a substantial Sudanese military-industrial structure connected to foreign commercial suppliers. U.S. Treasury findings concerning the Defense Industries System, Giad, TMAC and SBL Energy demonstrate how domestic defence institutions and international industrial relationships can jointly sustain procurement activity.

Fourth, the recruitment of former Colombian military personnel represents a documented expansion of the international military-services market into Sudan’s conflict. The importance of these personnel extends beyond manpower to the acquisition of specialised military functions, while the organisational structure of their recruitment creates challenges for enforcement.

Fifth, Iran, Russia, Turkey and China require differentiated treatment. Established procurement relationships, prospective strategic agreements, commercial supplier connections and manufacturing origin are separate evidentiary categories. Conflating them would obscure rather than clarify the nature of external involvement.

Sixth, the cumulative number of sanctions announcements is not a defensible measure of the amount of military capability actually disrupted. The effectiveness of enforcement depends on whether identified procurement and recruitment functions cease, diminish or migrate into replacement structures.

Seventh, the continued operation of external support networks creates a risk that the military economy associated with Sudan will retain organisational value beyond the immediate conflict. This is particularly consequential where internationally mobile personnel, commercial intermediaries and financing structures acquire experience that could be transferred to other environments.

What Would Change the Assessment

The present assessment would change materially if official investigations established direct governmental authorisation or control over transfers currently attributed only to private commercial organisations. Such evidence would affect the determination of state responsibility and alter the diplomatic consequences of the documented activity.

It would also change if reliable procurement records demonstrated that particular foreign support relationships had ceased or that previously announced agreements had become fully operational. The distinction between proposed and completed military cooperation is essential, particularly in relation to foreign maritime access, large equipment transactions and continuing maintenance arrangements.

The assessment of sanctions effectiveness would strengthen if competent authorities published evidence showing sustained reductions in procurement volumes, identifiable disruption of recruitment organisations or the elimination of specific financing channels. Conversely, documented successor structures, continued foreign recruitment and additional procurement transactions following enforcement measures would indicate that existing networks retained substantial adaptive capacity.

The principal unresolved official records include complete military export authorisations, verified end-user and end-use documentation, relevant corporate ownership and financial records, evidence of completed strategic agreements, and subsequent enforcement findings demonstrating whether named procurement or recruitment activities continued after designation.

Final Strategic Assessment

Sudan’s external military relationships have produced a conflict-support environment that is more complex than a conventional proxy-war model. Foreign assistance is not supplied through one uniform mechanism, nor is it necessarily controlled through a single hierarchy of political authority. It encompasses state-linked defence relationships, industrial procurement organisations, private recruitment networks, commercial intermediaries and international financial arrangements whose activities may intersect without forming a coherent alliance.

The decisive strategic issue is the relationship between external resources and the endurance of domestic military organisations. Foreign commercial and technical relationships can increase the ability of belligerents to replace equipment, acquire specialised capabilities and maintain military operations despite territorial and economic pressures. At the same time, the diversity of suppliers and intermediaries can reduce the effectiveness of measures directed against isolated participants.

The international community therefore confronts a problem of network governance as much as one of traditional diplomacy. The ability to influence the conflict depends upon identifying the specific transactions, organisations and services through which military capabilities are sustained, establishing responsibility at the correct legal and evidentiary level, and coordinating measures among jurisdictions without assuming that every foreign commercial relationship amounts to direct state sponsorship.

The central conclusion of Chapter 4 is that Sudan’s military endurance is increasingly connected to internationally distributed systems of supply, expertise and finance, while the political authority required to regulate those systems remains divided among states with different strategic interests. The resulting imbalance between transnational military capability and fragmented international control is one of the principal mechanisms through which Sudan’s conflict threatens to become a wider regional security problem.

OPEN-SOURCE ANALYTICAL ASSESSMENT | 15 OCTOBER 2026

PILLAR II — THE INTERNATIONALISATION OF THE CONFLICT

Chapter 5. Regional Spillover: Chad, Egypt, Libya, Ethiopia, the Sahel and the Red Sea

Sudan’s Regional Security Crisis: The Transformation of National Warfare into Cross-Border Strategic Instability

Sudan’s conflict is progressively transforming the security environment of northeastern Africa through a combination of population displacement, disrupted cross-border commerce, contested frontier security, military recruitment networks and the possible diffusion of advanced military capabilities. The consequences differ substantially between neighbouring states because their geographical exposure, institutional capacity, economic dependence and relationships with Sudan’s belligerents are not identical. Chad confronts immediate humanitarian and frontier-security pressures associated with Darfur; Egypt faces the challenge of managing large-scale displacement alongside its strategic interest in Sudanese state continuity; Libya represents a particularly sensitive intersection between fragmented political authority and trans-Saharan commercial and security networks; Ethiopia faces renewed insecurity along its western approaches; while the Sahel and Red Sea are exposed through more indirect but potentially consequential pathways.

The strategic significance of this regionalisation is that Sudan can generate cross-border instability without the conflict necessarily becoming a conventional interstate war. Population movements can strain neighbouring institutions without any military operation crossing a frontier. Armed commercial networks can influence security conditions through recruitment or procurement without establishing permanent bases in another country. Border incidents can produce diplomatic escalation even when attribution remains contested. Equally, insecurity within Sudan can reduce access to commercial routes and essential supplies used by neighbouring communities, creating economic consequences independently of military involvement.

This distinction is crucial for government-level assessments. Regional spillover is not a single phenomenon whose intensity can be measured through a uniform indicator. It encompasses separate processes with different levels of evidence, legal implications and potential responses. Refugee movements can be documented through registration and monitoring systems; restrictions on trade require economic evidence; foreign military activity requires reliable attribution; and claims concerning support for particular armed organisations require evidence connecting an actor to the specific conduct alleged.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ 2026 Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan, published on 20 February 2026, established a planning framework covering the Central African Republic, Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya, South Sudan and Uganda. The plan identified approximately 4.4 million refugees already displaced in the wider regional response, alongside a planning figure of 5.9 million people, financial requirements of approximately US$1.6 billion and the participation of 123 partners. It also warned that disrupted cross-border trade had contributed to food and fuel inflation in neighbouring countries, increasing pressure on already vulnerable households. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees — February 2026.

These figures have different statistical meanings. The 5.9 million figure is a response-planning population, not a verified count of newly displaced Sudanese refugees. The US$1.6 billion represents financial requirements, not expenditure or confirmed funding. The 123 partners constitute a programme participation figure, not a measure of operational capacity or geographic coverage.

The latest regional information available by the adopted cut-off further illustrates the scale and complexity of displacement. UNHCR’s situation portal, updated on 5 October 2026, recorded 11,321,158 forcibly displaced people within its combined reporting framework. The portal separately identified 6,409,546 internally displaced people, based on data updated on 20 September, and 3,695,741 newly arrived refugees and asylum-seekers outside Sudan, alongside 942,113 newly arrived refugee returnees. These categories must remain differentiated because internally displaced populations, cross-border refugees, asylum-seekers and returning nationals are not interchangeable statistical groups. Sudan Situation — UNHCR Operational Data Portal — October 2026.

The difference between the February planning framework and the October operational data demonstrates why regional policy cannot rely on a single headline displacement figure. Governments must distinguish the population requiring assistance from the population currently registered, the projected caseload from realised arrivals and temporary population movement from durable settlement. These distinctions determine the financing needs, legal responsibilities and administrative demands facing each host country.

Table 5.1 — Regional Humanitarian Exposure: Official Quantitative Baseline

Indicator	Verified value	Reference period	Definition	Strategic relevance
Regional response-planning population	5.9 million	2026 planning year	People included in the regional response framework	Establishes the scale of planned international assistance
Regional financial requirements	US$1.6 billion	2026 planning year	Requested programme financing	Indicates the financial resources sought by participating organisations
Participating regional response partners	123	February 2026	Organisations within the response plan	Reflects the institutional complexity of the regional operation
Regional refugee population described in planning document	Approximately 4.4 million	February 2026	Refugees displaced across the regional response environment	Establishes regional population pressure at the planning stage
Combined forcibly displaced population	11,321,158	UNHCR portal, updated 5 October 2026	Combined population categories in the situation-monitoring framework	Illustrates the overall scale of displacement associated with the crisis
Internally displaced population	6,409,546	Updated 20 September 2026	People displaced within Sudan	Relevant to internal recovery and possible further movements
Newly arrived refugees and asylum-seekers outside Sudan	3,695,741	Updated 5 October 2026	Cross-border protection population	Directly relevant to neighbouring host-country capacity
Newly arrived refugee returnees	942,113	Updated 5 October 2026	Returnees recorded within the regional situation framework	Requires separate analysis from Sudanese refugee arrivals

Sources: UNHCR Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — February 2026; UNHCR Sudan Situation Operational Data Portal — October 2026.

The figures should not be mechanically added because some are planning projections and others are monitoring categories with distinct reference dates. A refugee who enters one state, subsequently moves to another and later returns may also create different administrative records over time. Such movements require careful longitudinal analysis before being interpreted as permanent demographic change.

Chad: The Principal Western Humanitarian Interface and a Vulnerable Frontier Security System

Eastern Chad is exposed simultaneously to refugee pressure, border insecurity and disrupted regional commerce

Chad represents one of the most immediate geographical transmission points of Sudan’s war because the frontier adjoining Darfur connects a severely contested region with communities and administrative systems that must accommodate large-scale civilian displacement. The resulting pressure is not confined to refugee camps. It affects water supply, healthcare, education, local markets, transport infrastructure, employment opportunities and relations between displaced populations and host communities.

The regional response plan identifies eastern Chad as one of the principal receiving areas for Sudanese refugees, reflecting both geographical accessibility from Darfur and the severe violence that has driven people across the border. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

The operational challenge is particularly demanding because reception areas often possess limited infrastructure even before additional populations arrive. In such circumstances, assistance to refugees cannot be separated from the capacity of host communities to access the same essential services. A newly established medical facility serving displaced people may alleviate humanitarian needs, but continued pressure on existing regional health systems can still generate local tensions if surrounding communities remain underserved.

Water availability illustrates the problem. Increased demand requires additional extraction, treatment, distribution and maintenance. Provision through temporary emergency systems may respond to immediate needs, but longer-term settlement requires more reliable infrastructure and institutional management. Similar considerations apply to schools, sanitation and local transportation.

The strategic vulnerability of eastern Chad is therefore an imbalance between rapidly changing population requirements and the comparatively slow process of expanding durable public infrastructure. Humanitarian financing can alleviate this imbalance, but sustainable improvement requires investment, administrative capacity and security conditions that allow infrastructure to function.

Border militarisation creates a separate risk from refugee displacement

Chad also faces the possibility of military incidents affecting its frontier with Sudan. Such incidents may arise from fighting near the boundary, movement of armed personnel, disputes over logistics or operations whose effects cross into neighbouring territory. These possibilities have different evidentiary requirements and should not be combined into a general claim that Chad has become a participant in Sudan’s war.

The August 2026 United Nations Security Council briefing identified increasing concern about cross-border developments and the destabilising implications of continued fighting in Sudan. This broader institutional warning supports heightened regional monitoring, but it does not establish that every armed incident near Chad is attributable to a Sudanese belligerent or a foreign government. Security Council Meeting on Sudan — United Nations Security Council — August 2026.

There are three distinct escalation mechanisms. First, military operations conducted close to the border may produce accidental or deliberate effects across it. Second, armed personnel can move through frontier regions whose geography and institutional conditions complicate surveillance. Third, allegations concerning military assistance may create diplomatic confrontation even when the complete chain of responsibility remains disputed.

The legal and political consequences differ considerably. An incidental border event does not necessarily establish an armed attack attributable to another state. Conversely, repeated verified attacks against territory or state personnel could produce a more serious interstate security issue.

Chad’s strategic requirement is therefore to distinguish frontier defence, humanitarian reception and diplomatic crisis management as complementary but separate responsibilities. Excessive militarisation of refugee areas could undermine humanitarian protection, while failure to monitor credible military threats could expose civilians and national security institutions to additional danger.

The political consequences of refugee concentration

Large refugee populations can alter the economic structure of reception areas. Demand for food, housing, transport and services may increase, creating commercial opportunities but also potentially raising prices or intensifying competition over scarce resources. The outcome depends on the scale and composition of humanitarian assistance, access to markets, employment arrangements and local governance.

An important distinction concerns whether aid programmes support only displaced people or also strengthen services used by host populations. Where local communities perceive that assistance bypasses their needs, tensions may increase even when humanitarian organisations are operating according to recognised protection principles.

Chad’s long-term stability consequently requires assistance programmes that address both refugee protection and the resilience of host communities. This is not an argument for reducing refugee entitlements; it is a recognition that protection is more sustainable where host-country institutions and populations receive adequate support.

Egypt: Sudanese State Continuity, Population Reception and the Strategic Importance of the Nile

Egypt’s exposure is defined by the intersection of security, demography and regional diplomacy

Egypt’s relationship with Sudan is strategically different from Chad’s because Cairo’s interests extend beyond border reception to the political continuity of Sudanese state institutions, Nile-related regional relations and the wider security balance of northeastern Africa. The countries share extensive historical, economic and social connections, while their proximity means that instability in Sudan can create both immediate humanitarian pressures and longer-term questions concerning the future configuration of regional authority.

Egypt is among the principal destinations for Sudanese people displaced by the conflict. UNHCR’s regional response framework identifies Egypt and eastern Chad as major hosts of Sudanese refugees. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

The administrative implications differ from those of a predominantly camp-based reception system. A substantial refugee population living in urban areas may interact directly with national housing markets, schools, healthcare providers, transportation systems and employment opportunities. The associated costs are not necessarily visible in the same way as expenditure on dedicated refugee settlements.

Urban reception can provide advantages where displaced people are able to access existing services and economic opportunities. However, it can also create problems when national institutions are already operating under budgetary constraints or when legal and administrative procedures restrict access to employment, documentation or public services.

The appropriate assessment must distinguish three groups: Sudanese refugees and asylum-seekers, other Sudanese residents, and Egyptian citizens affected indirectly by changing demand for services. These populations do not possess identical legal status or requirements, and they should not be combined when evaluating public expenditure or employment effects.

Cairo’s preference for institutional continuity has strategic consequences

Egypt has a direct interest in avoiding prolonged fragmentation of Sudanese authority because the future character of Sudan’s government influences bilateral cooperation, frontier security and regional diplomacy. A unified, functioning Sudanese state would generally provide a more predictable institutional counterpart than competing armed administrations exercising authority over disconnected territories.

This preference does not establish that Egypt controls the SAF or that every Egyptian diplomatic decision constitutes military sponsorship. Political alignment, official diplomatic recognition and direct military assistance are distinct forms of relationship, each requiring separate evidence.

The Nile dimension adds further strategic significance. Sudan occupies a geographically important position between Egypt and upstream Nile Basin states. Major changes in Sudan’s political institutions could complicate negotiations, technical cooperation and management arrangements concerning water-related infrastructure.

Nevertheless, Sudan’s civil war should not be treated as an automatic cause of a particular Nile-water outcome. Water security depends on hydrology, infrastructure, interstate agreements, climate variability and the decisions of multiple governments. Political fragmentation may make coordination more difficult without determining the substance of every future dispute.

Egypt’s principal risk is prolonged regional institutional uncertainty

Egypt’s most consequential exposure is not necessarily an immediate military incident. It is the possibility that Sudan remains divided into competing political and military structures for an extended period, making bilateral security arrangements, refugee policy and regional negotiations increasingly difficult to manage.

A prolonged conflict can require Cairo to maintain relations with established Sudanese institutions while confronting practical realities in territories beyond those institutions’ control. This can generate tension between diplomatic recognition and operational necessity.

The Egyptian government consequently faces a strategic choice between concentrating on short-term security concerns and supporting arrangements capable of preserving the long-term viability of Sudanese national institutions. These objectives need not conflict, but pursuing one without the other risks perpetuating uncertainty.

Libya: Fragmented Authority, Trans-Saharan Networks and the Risks of Commercial-Military Intermediation

Libya’s relevance is structural rather than reducible to a single documented supply route

Libya occupies a strategically sensitive position because its own political fragmentation and extensive connections across the Sahara create an environment in which cross-border commercial activity, migration and armed networks may interact. The relationship with Sudan is geographically indirect compared with the Chad–Darfur frontier, but Libya’s southern connections form part of the wider trans-Saharan system linking North Africa, the Sahel and northeastern Africa.

The principal analytical risk is that existing regional commercial and armed networks may provide opportunities for military-related transactions or movements whose effects extend beyond the jurisdiction of any single state. This is a statement about structural vulnerability, not an assertion that all commercial traffic across southern Libya is illicit or that specific Libyan authorities have been proven responsible for every alleged transfer supporting Sudanese belligerents.

Determining actual involvement requires evidence identifying the goods transported, the parties arranging their movement, the applicable legal requirements and the ultimate recipient. The mere existence of a route through Libya does not establish that it has been used for a particular prohibited transaction.

The distinction is especially important because civilian commerce and humanitarian movement may depend on some of the same transportation environments that are exposed to illicit activity. Broad restrictions based solely on geography could disrupt lawful livelihoods without effectively identifying the transactions of security concern.

The migration dimension requires separate evidence from military logistics

Libya also remains relevant to wider African migration systems. Sudanese displacement may contribute to population movements involving Libya, but the relationship should not be understood as a predictable progression from Sudan to Libya and then to Europe.

Migration decisions are influenced by family networks, financial resources, documentation, access to protection, conditions in intermediate countries and the policies of receiving states. Individuals may remain in neighbouring countries, seek formal international protection, move between urban areas or return when conditions permit.

Sudan’s refugee statistics cannot be converted into forecasts of arrivals in Libya or the Mediterranean without a separate empirical model. Treating displacement totals as a direct predictor of migration towards Europe would create a misleading causal relationship and could result in poorly targeted policy responses.

The appropriate policy approach is to support protection and registration systems while obtaining reliable information about actual movements and the conditions affecting displaced people.

The critical variable is the ability to distinguish lawful trade from prohibited military activity

Libya’s relevance to Sudanese regional security also demonstrates why financial and customs enforcement must operate through transaction-level evidence. Commercial intermediaries may be registered in one country, conduct transactions through another and arrange delivery elsewhere. Determining whether a particular transaction violates applicable restrictions requires information about ownership, goods, destination, authorisation and the legal regime in force.

A security strategy based exclusively on physical border enforcement would neglect the corporate and financial relationships that can sustain prohibited transactions. Conversely, a strategy that assumes all cross-border trade is suspicious could undermine legitimate economic activity and regional livelihoods.

The operational objective should therefore be more reliable attribution of prohibited transactions rather than indiscriminate restriction of regional commerce.

Ethiopia: Western Frontier Insecurity, Blue Nile and the Interaction Between Two Regional Security Crises

Ethiopia’s exposure is shaped by the intersection of Sudanese fighting and its own internal security environment

Ethiopia’s vulnerability to Sudan’s conflict arises from the proximity of military activity in eastern Sudan to Ethiopian frontier regions, the presence of displaced populations and the wider political complexity of relations across the Blue Nile Basin. Unlike Chad, whose most immediate exposure is strongly associated with Darfur, Ethiopia faces security risks connected to the Blue Nile region, cross-border population movements and the possibility that armed activity near the frontier could intensify existing political tensions.

The distinction between geographical proximity and demonstrated foreign intervention remains essential. Sudanese accusations concerning the use of neighbouring territory for military activity are relevant evidence of an interstate dispute, but they do not independently establish the accuracy of every allegation.

During the United Nations Security Council’s deliberations in 2026, Sudanese representatives presented allegations concerning unmanned aircraft entering Sudanese airspace from neighbouring territory and claimed that technical information connected particular incidents to foreign launch locations. These statements form part of the official diplomatic record, but the public proceedings do not themselves constitute an independently verified technical reconstruction of the flights or proof of responsibility by a neighbouring government. Reports of the Secretary-General on the Sudan and South Sudan — United Nations Security Council, 10184th Meeting — 2026.

This evidentiary distinction is consequential. An aircraft crossing an international boundary could indicate unauthorised use of neighbouring airspace, operations originating from the neighbouring state, or other circumstances requiring further investigation. Establishing governmental responsibility would require evidence of authorisation, direction, control or other conduct attributable under the applicable rules of international law.

The Blue Nile region creates overlapping military and humanitarian pressures

Insecurity in Blue Nile presents a particular challenge because civilian movement and military activity occur within a wider border environment whose communities depend on cross-border access and regional markets. The movement of displaced populations towards Ethiopia places pressure on reception, registration, healthcare and protection arrangements, while renewed fighting may complicate the ability of humanitarian organisations to maintain reliable operations.

Ethiopia is one of the seven countries included in UNHCR’s 2026 regional response plan. This establishes a verified humanitarian relationship with the Sudanese crisis, although the aggregate regional planning figures should not be converted into an Ethiopia-specific refugee total without consulting the relevant national reporting series. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

The longer-term problem is that frontier insecurity can affect communities whose economic and social relationships historically extend across the formal state boundary. Movement restrictions, insecurity and disrupted commerce may undermine livelihoods even where the areas concerned are not experiencing sustained ground combat.

For Ethiopia, protecting these communities requires distinguishing lawful civilian movement from potential armed activity, while avoiding security responses that unnecessarily prevent access to asylum or humanitarian assistance.

Nile diplomacy and frontier security must not be collapsed into one conflict

Relations among Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt are affected by the management of the Nile Basin and major water-related infrastructure. However, the existence of differences over water policy does not establish that Ethiopia’s decisions concerning Sudan’s war are primarily determined by those disagreements.

A causal assessment would require evidence connecting specific diplomatic decisions, military relationships or economic measures with defined water-policy objectives. In the absence of such evidence, the more defensible conclusion is that Sudan’s institutional fragmentation introduces additional uncertainty into an already complex regional diplomatic environment.

Ethiopia’s strategic interest lies in avoiding the emergence of a permanently unstable western frontier while preserving the conditions for predictable interstate cooperation. Further deterioration in Sudan could complicate both objectives, but the magnitude of those consequences will depend on developments inside Ethiopia as well as Sudan.

The Sahel: The Possibility of Military-Knowledge Diffusion and the Limits of Proliferation Claims

The most consequential prospective risk concerns organisational learning rather than the automatic transfer of complete weapon systems

Sudan’s conflict raises concerns about the possible diffusion of military expertise through transnational recruitment and armed-group networks. The issue is particularly relevant to the Sahel, where several states already confront threats from armed organisations, weak territorial administration in peripheral regions and cross-border illicit economies.

The principal proliferation concern is that skills, commercial contacts and organisational practices developed during one conflict may become available to participants in another. This is different from asserting that sophisticated Sudanese military equipment has already been transferred to particular Sahelian organisations.

The distinction between technical knowledge and equipment transfer is important. Knowledge may move through individuals who change employers, join other armed groups or establish training relationships. The acquisition of equipment, by contrast, requires access to physical systems, finance, transportation and relevant technical support. These processes can intersect but do not necessarily occur together.

The recruitment of experienced foreign military personnel for operations in Sudan demonstrates that internationally distributed personnel networks already form part of the conflict environment. The U.S. Treasury’s June 2026 action identified recruitment structures alongside procurement networks supporting both Sudanese belligerents and explicitly warned that continuing violence was contributing to wider regional instability. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

Nevertheless, documented recruitment for Sudan does not establish that the same personnel are providing services to armed organisations in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso or other Sahelian states. Such a conclusion would require evidence identifying the individuals, recipient organisations and relevant activities.

The appropriate risk assessment is therefore conditional. Military-service networks could become relevant to other conflicts if they retain trained personnel, obtain financing and establish relationships with additional armed organisations. Without these conditions, the existence of foreign recruitment in Sudan does not demonstrate a functioning regional market for all categories of sophisticated military technology.

Sahelian instability creates an environment in which diffusion could have disproportionate consequences

The consequences of additional military capabilities depend heavily on the institutional environment in which they are introduced. An armed organisation operating in a region with limited state surveillance and difficult terrain may derive advantages from improved observation or communications. However, those advantages do not automatically translate into strategic success, and they may be constrained by equipment availability, technical expertise and countermeasures.

The relevant security concern is not that one technology will necessarily transform every conflict. It is that the accumulation of technical and organisational capabilities may increase the complexity of threats confronting governments with already limited resources.

A defensive response based exclusively on the acquisition of additional equipment would neglect the underlying economic and social conditions that permit armed organisations to recruit, finance operations and maintain territorial influence.

Sahelian governments and regional partners consequently require an integrated approach combining legally authorised financial investigations, control of prohibited transfers, protection of civilian populations and measures supporting legitimate governance.

The distinction between terrorism, insurgency and paramilitary warfare must remain legally precise

The presence of armed non-state organisations in different regions does not make their legal status identical. Some groups are designated as terrorist organisations under particular national or international regimes; others participate in non-international armed conflicts without being subject to the same designations.

The RSF’s participation in Sudan’s armed conflict does not automatically determine its classification under every counterterrorism framework. Similarly, the fact that an armed organisation is not designated as terrorist does not exempt it from applicable humanitarian-law obligations.

The United Nations Security Council’s Resolution 1540 (2004) addresses the proliferation of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and their means of delivery, including prohibitions concerning support to non-state actors. It should not be represented as a general international prohibition on all conventional drones or as an automatic legal framework covering every armed unmanned aircraft. Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004) — United Nations Security Council — April 2004.

The relevant legal instruments depend on the particular equipment, the nature of the transfer, the recipient, the applicable sanctions regime and the obligations binding the states involved.

The Red Sea: Sudanese Territorial Insecurity and the Strategic Reliability of Maritime Connectivity

Sudan’s coastal instability is significant even without verified attacks against international shipping by Sudanese belligerents

Sudan’s Red Sea coast creates a direct geographical relationship between the conflict and one of the world’s important maritime transport systems. However, the strategic consequences must be evaluated without conflating Sudanese operations with the separate security crisis involving attacks against shipping elsewhere in the Red Sea region.

The immediate Sudan-specific maritime concern is the reliability of coastal infrastructure, international access and nationally important logistical functions. Damage or disruption affecting ports, airports, fuel facilities and transportation connections can reduce the predictability of commercial and humanitarian operations. Whether these effects extend into wider maritime transport costs depends on the affected facilities, the duration of interruption and the availability of alternatives.

The May 2025 attacks on Port Sudan demonstrated the exposure of critical infrastructure in an internationally connected coastal city. The United Nations reported attacks against the international airport, fuel facilities and electricity infrastructure and warned of potential consequences for humanitarian supply chains. Port Sudan Drone Attacks: A Call to Protect Civilian Infrastructure — United Nations in Sudan — May 2025.

The attacks established a threat to infrastructure supporting Sudan’s access to the outside world. They did not, by themselves, establish that the RSF had acquired the capability or intention to attack international commercial vessels.

This distinction matters for maritime-security planning. Port resilience, humanitarian logistics and ship protection involve different operational tasks and legal authorities. An appropriate response must address the verified vulnerability rather than assuming that all military threats in the wider Red Sea share the same origin.

The commercial effects are transmitted through confidence and logistical reliability

Commercial infrastructure can suffer economic consequences even when physical damage is limited. Interruptions to transport schedules may reduce confidence among operators and customers, while repeated security incidents can increase the costs of maintaining reliable services.

These effects require documentary evidence before being translated into monetary losses or insurance-price estimates. A rise in regional freight rates cannot automatically be attributed to Sudan, particularly when other security and commercial factors affect the same maritime corridor.

The appropriate analytical approach is to separate Sudan-specific disruptions from changes attributable to the wider Red Sea maritime environment. This permits governments and commercial operators to develop contingency arrangements proportional to the actual threat.

The geopolitical concern is the multiplication of simultaneous regional crises

The Red Sea connects several strategic environments, including northeastern Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, the Suez Canal and the Indian Ocean. The persistence of separate security crises in different parts of this system can complicate diplomatic coordination and increase demands on the institutions responsible for commercial navigation, humanitarian access and regional stability.

Sudan’s conflict can contribute to that complexity through damaged infrastructure, uncertainty over coastal administration and the external political relationships of its belligerents.

Yet a regional system experiencing several crises should not be described as a single coordinated conflict without evidence connecting the responsible actors and operations. Preserving this distinction allows decision-makers to identify opportunities for cooperation while avoiding unsupported assumptions about common command, financing or strategic intent.

Comparative Regional Exposure: Six Different Mechanisms of Spillover

Table 5.2 — Country and Regional Risk Matrix

Geography	Principal verified exposure	Potential escalation mechanism	Main uncertainty	Most appropriate policy priority
Chad	Major refugee reception and proximity to Darfur fighting	Border incidents, further displacement and pressure on host communities	Attribution and frequency of cross-border military activity	Civilian protection, host-community resilience and frontier incident verification
Egypt	Major reception of displaced Sudanese and strategic dependence on regional stability	Prolonged displacement, weakened Sudanese institutions and diplomatic uncertainty	Future political configuration of Sudan and durability of population movements	Humanitarian administration and support for coherent Sudanese state institutions
Libya	Inclusion in the regional refugee response and exposure to trans-Saharan mobility systems	Potential use of commercial or irregular networks and population movement	Specific military transfers and responsibility of particular actors	Evidence-based financial and border enforcement alongside protection measures
Ethiopia	Refugee reception and exposure to insecurity near Blue Nile	Border incidents, local displacement and deteriorating interstate relations	Independent attribution of alleged military activity across the frontier	Civilian protection, verified border monitoring and diplomatic risk reduction
Sahel	Regional security environment involving armed groups and transnational mobility	Possible diffusion of military expertise or services	Whether identifiable Sudan-linked networks operate in other conflicts	Targeted monitoring of documented transfers and financial facilitators
Red Sea	Sudanese coastal infrastructure vulnerability and wider commercial connectivity	Disruption of port-related services and regional confidence	Extent of Sudan-specific effects on maritime trade	Infrastructure resilience and separation of distinct maritime threat categories

Sources: UNHCR Regional Response Plan 2026; United Nations Security Council Briefing on Sudan — August 2026; U.S. Treasury Sudan Procurement and Recruitment Enforcement — June 2026; UN Statement on Port Sudan Infrastructure — May 2025.

The categories identify different mechanisms rather than assigning arbitrary numerical risk scores. The presence of a possible escalation pathway does not establish that the associated event has occurred.

The Regional Economic Transmission Mechanism: Border Trade, Inflation and Host-Country Capacity

The regional consequences of Sudan’s war extend beyond population movement and military security because neighbouring economies are connected through trade, transport and labour relationships. The disruption of cross-border commerce can alter the availability of goods, raise transportation costs and reduce the economic opportunities available to communities that previously depended upon exchange with Sudanese markets.

UNHCR’s 2026 regional plan explicitly identified disruptions to cross-border trade as contributing to food and fuel inflation in countries receiving people displaced by the war. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

The economic mechanism operates through several stages. Conflict can restrict production and transportation within Sudan. Reduced availability of traded goods can affect neighbouring markets, particularly in border regions with limited alternatives. Increased demand associated with new population arrivals may add pressure on goods and services. At the same time, humanitarian assistance can influence local markets through procurement, employment and the distribution of cash or supplies.

These effects are not uniformly negative. Increased commercial demand can create opportunities for businesses and service providers, while international assistance may finance infrastructure benefiting host communities. The net outcome depends on the distribution of costs and benefits, the functioning of local markets and the ability of public institutions to regulate economic activity.

A quantitative assessment would require country-specific trade statistics, consumer prices, transport costs and population data. The available official regional planning document establishes the existence of economic pressure but does not justify attributing all inflation in neighbouring states to Sudan.

Table 5.3 — Regional Economic Effects and the Evidence Required for Quantification

Transmission channel	Economic mechanism	Required measurement	Principal attribution challenge
Border trade disruption	Reduced availability or higher cost of cross-border goods	Bilateral trade flows and relevant prices	Other domestic and international factors influence trade
Refugee reception	Increased demand for housing, water, health and education	Local population changes and service capacity	Needs differ between urban and camp settings
Transport insecurity	Higher expenditure and reduced reliability of movement	Route access, delivery time and verified freight costs	Security and infrastructure failures may overlap
Food availability	Disrupted supply and changing purchasing power	Food-price series and market assessments	Climatic, exchange-rate and domestic policy effects
Fuel markets	Reduced cross-border availability or distribution reliability	Fuel supply and retail-price data	Global fuel prices also influence local markets
Host-community employment	Changes in labour supply and demand	Employment and wage data by locality	Population movement can affect sectors differently
Humanitarian procurement	Increased local purchases and service demand	Programme procurement and local market data	Positive and negative price effects must be separated
Public expenditure	Additional demand on national and local institutions	Government and donor financing records	Donor contributions may offset only some costs

The mechanisms are consistent with the regional economic pressures documented in the UNHCR 2026 Regional Refugee Response Plan, but the table does not attribute unsupported monetary values to individual countries.

Regional Security Governance: Why Bilateral Responses Are Insufficient

The interconnected nature of Sudan’s regional consequences creates a coordination problem. Each neighbouring country has legitimate national responsibilities, but measures taken independently may have unintended consequences elsewhere.

Restricting border movement may alter refugee routes without reducing the underlying need for protection. Disrupting a commercial corridor may affect both prohibited transactions and lawful trade. Expanding security deployments can improve surveillance but may increase tension if responsibility for incidents remains disputed.

The strategic challenge is to establish coordination mechanisms capable of distinguishing humanitarian, commercial and military activity without treating them as interchangeable security problems.

The African Union, UNHCR and other competent international and regional institutions can provide frameworks for cooperation, but the relevant authority depends on the activity concerned. Refugee protection is governed by applicable international and regional obligations. Military operations require separate legal justification. Financial and customs enforcement must follow national and international law.

A defensible policy would therefore combine reliable incident verification, protection of civilians, support for host-state public services, cooperation against prohibited military transactions and diplomatic arrangements to reduce the risk of interstate escalation.

Such coordination would not eliminate Sudan’s conflict, but it could reduce the likelihood that instability within Sudan produces additional crises beyond its borders.

Key Judgments — Chapter 5

Sudan’s regional destabilisation is already established through large-scale displacement and economic disruption, while the scale of direct cross-border military involvement remains more unevenly documented. Treating these different phenomena as a single category would exaggerate some threats and obscure others.

Chad faces an immediate combination of refugee pressure and frontier insecurity. Its long-term resilience depends on assistance that strengthens host communities as well as refugee protection.

Egypt has a strategic interest in the continuity of Sudanese state institutions and faces substantial displacement-related responsibilities. Its military and diplomatic relationships must be evaluated separately rather than assumed from geographic and political proximity.

Libya represents a potential intersection between fragmented governance, trans-Saharan mobility and internationally distributed commercial networks. Specific allegations of military activity require transaction-level and actor-specific verification.

Ethiopia faces risks associated with Blue Nile insecurity and sensitive interstate relationships. Allegations concerning military operations originating from neighbouring territory must be distinguished from independently verified findings.

The Sahelian proliferation danger concerns the possible transfer of expertise, services and organisational relationships. The documented existence of foreign military personnel networks in Sudan does not establish their deployment in additional conflicts.

Sudan’s Red Sea exposure is principally associated with the vulnerability of coastal infrastructure and international connectivity. It must not be conflated with separate attacks against international shipping elsewhere in the region.

What Would Change the Assessment — Chapter 5

The assessment of regional military escalation would change materially if independent technical investigations established repeated cross-border operations, verified supply routes or direct participation by neighbouring state institutions. Such evidence would permit a more precise distinction between isolated incidents, private network activity and state-attributable conduct.

Regional humanitarian assessments would change if country-specific UNHCR and government data demonstrated sustained reductions in arrivals, reliable expansion of public services and improvements in the conditions allowing voluntary and durable return. Conversely, further displacement into already strained reception areas, recurring border incidents and the deterioration of host-country infrastructure would strengthen the assessment of prolonged regional instability.

The principal missing records are harmonised country-level refugee and return series, independently verified border-incident investigations, trade and price data from affected frontier regions, and evidence identifying the operators and beneficiaries of any prohibited cross-border military transactions.

The final strategic assessment of Chapter 5 is that Sudan has become a regional source of persistent insecurity whose consequences travel through distinct humanitarian, economic and military pathways. The most effective response requires differentiated national policies integrated through regional cooperation, rather than an assumption that the conflict’s consequences can be contained by strengthening borders alone.

Chapter 6. Economic Warfare, International Law, Sanctions and Arms-Transfer Governance

The War Economy as a System of Military Regeneration and Political Power

The economic foundations of Sudan’s conflict have become as strategically consequential as its battlefield developments because the ability of the principal belligerents to finance personnel, procure equipment, maintain military organisations and preserve commercial relationships directly influences the duration of hostilities. Economic warfare in this environment is not confined to deliberate attacks against productive assets or restrictions on international trade. It also encompasses competition over revenue-generating activities, the mobilisation of military-associated companies, access to foreign currency, cross-border procurement and the use of financial intermediaries capable of supporting military operations despite deteriorating national economic conditions.

The central distinction is between Sudan’s national economy, the economic activities associated with particular armed organisations and the internationally connected networks through which military resources are obtained. These spheres overlap, but they are not identical. A commercial company may conduct legitimate civilian business while also maintaining a relationship with a military institution. A commodity may be essential to ordinary livelihoods while generating revenue for armed actors. International transfers may occur through authorised commercial channels, prohibited transactions or arrangements whose legal status depends on documentation not available in the public record.

Consequently, restricting economic activity can have different effects depending on which function is targeted. Measures directed at identified military procurement organisations may constrain particular transactions. Restrictions covering a commodity can influence broader markets and require more extensive compliance systems. A general interruption of commercial activity may harm civilians without necessarily eliminating the financial resources available to armed organisations.

The fundamental policy objective should therefore be to reduce the resources enabling serious violence while preserving the lawful economic functions necessary for civilian survival and eventual reconstruction. Achieving this balance requires a clear understanding of the relevant legal frameworks, the institutions responsible for implementation and the evidence necessary to establish that particular economic activities contribute to the conflict.

The U.S. Treasury established an early official account of the conflict’s corporate foundations on 1 June 2023, when it designated four military-affiliated companies connected to the SAF and RSF. The action identified Al Junaid Multi Activities Co Ltd, associated with members of the Dagalo family, and Tradive General Trading L.L.C., identified as an RSF procurement company, alongside enterprises connected to the SAF. Treasury described the purpose of the measures as restricting the financial resources available to organisations sustaining the war. Treasury Sanctions Military-Affiliated Companies Fueling Both Sides of the Conflict in Sudan — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2023.

The significance of this record extends beyond the entities designated. It establishes that the economic organisation of the conflict includes commercial structures whose legal form may differ substantially from the military organisations they support. The practical challenge for international authorities is therefore to identify the relationship between a transaction, the corporate entity conducting it and the ultimate military beneficiary.

Gold as a Strategic Commodity: Revenue, Liquidity and the Limits of Financial Denial

The importance of gold lies in its relationship to internationally transferable value

Gold occupies a significant position in Sudan’s war economy because it is a valuable commodity capable of entering international commercial and financial relationships. Its strategic relevance depends on ownership, control of production, trading arrangements, access to buyers and the conversion of proceeds into resources usable by armed organisations.

The existence of gold production does not automatically establish that every transaction finances military activity. Sudanese mining and trading also involve civilian workers, businesses and communities whose livelihoods may depend on the sector. The policy question is therefore not whether all gold-related activity should be characterised as illegitimate, but whether specific transactions or structures provide resources that sustain the conflict.

The U.S. Treasury’s June 2023 designation of Al Junaid identified its connections to RSF leadership and described its participation in gold mining and other commercial activities. This established an official basis for examining the relationship between mineral-sector revenues and paramilitary financing. Treasury Sanctions Military-Affiliated Companies Fueling Both Sides of the Conflict in Sudan — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2023.

The economic mechanism operates through several stages. A controlled or affiliated business may obtain revenue from extraction, processing or trade. That revenue may support commercial expenditure, accumulate as financial assets or become available to associated organisations. Determining whether it finances prohibited military activity requires evidence of the relevant ownership, transfers or transactions.

A gross export value is not equivalent to the amount available for military procurement. Production expenditure, intermediaries, taxation, operating costs and differences between declared and realised revenue can all affect the financial resources ultimately available to particular actors.

This distinction is essential because unsupported estimates of armed-group revenues can distort policy decisions. A report identifying a large national gold-export value does not necessarily establish the share controlled by any belligerent. Likewise, the existence of illicit trading allegations does not justify assuming that all exports through a particular country are associated with unlawful military financing.

The European Union’s July 2026 measures constitute a significant change in regulatory strategy

On 13 July 2026, the Council of the European Union adopted new sectoral restrictive measures directed towards the Sudanese war economy. The measures prohibit defined transactions involving Sudanese-origin gold and restrict the sale, supply, transfer or export of mercury and cyanide used in gold mining and exploitation, together with specified associated services.

The Council stated that its purpose was to limit sources of conflict financing and increase pressure on those sustaining the war. Sudan: Council Strengthens EU Sanctions Regime by Targeting Gold Trade — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The significance is legal as well as economic. Instead of relying exclusively on named individuals or companies, the European Union introduced restrictions concerning particular economic activities and goods. A transaction may therefore fall within the prohibition because of product origin, date of export or the nature of the goods or services, even where the immediate commercial counterparty is not separately designated.

The Council’s statement of 29 July 2026 clarified that the gold restriction concerned gold originating in Sudan and exported from Sudan into the European Union or a third country after 15 July 2026. The statement also identified twelve European and neighbouring countries aligning themselves with the relevant Council decision, thereby extending the geographical scope of political cooperation beyond EU membership. Statement on Alignment with Sudan Restrictive Measures — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The precise prohibitions, exceptions and responsibilities must be determined from the operative legal instruments, particularly Council Decision (CFSP) 2026/1705 and Council Regulation (EU) 2026/1724, rather than from general policy statements alone. Council Decision (CFSP) 2026/1705 — Official Journal of the European Union — July 2026; Council Regulation (EU) 2026/1724 — Official Journal of the European Union — July 2026.

Enforcement effectiveness depends on more than the existence of a legal prohibition

Commodity restrictions can reduce access to a regulated market, but their actual effect on military financing depends on trade patterns, enforcement capacity and the ability of commercial actors to identify the origin of goods.

Where an internationally traded commodity passes through several intermediaries, establishing origin may require documentary records extending beyond the immediate seller. Commercial declarations, customs information and ownership documentation can become important, but they do not necessarily establish the complete history of every shipment.

The potential for market substitution presents another problem. A restriction imposed within one jurisdiction may redirect commercial interest towards markets outside that jurisdiction. Whether such substitution occurs, and whether it preserves the financial resources available to prohibited actors, requires subsequent evidence.

The success of the EU gold restrictions cannot be measured through their adoption alone. It must be assessed through verified changes in relevant transactions, enforcement findings and the demonstrated impact on the economic relationships the measures were intended to affect.

Table 6.1 — Sudan’s War Economy: Distinct Financial Functions and Regulatory Exposure

Economic function	Documented basis	Potential military significance	Appropriate enforcement approach	Principal limitation
Gold production and trading	U.S. Treasury identification of Al Junaid and EU findings concerning conflict financing	Revenue potentially available through military-associated commercial structures	Applicable commodity restrictions, sanctions and financial investigations	National production or export figures do not establish armed-group revenue
Military-associated industrial enterprises	U.S. Treasury findings concerning SAF-linked companies	Procurement and industrial support	Targeted sanctions and transaction-specific controls	Industrial output cannot be inferred from corporate ownership alone
International procurement services	Official identification of procurement intermediaries	Access to military equipment and components	Export licensing, end-user scrutiny and sanctions enforcement	Identifying a company does not establish every transaction
Foreign personnel recruitment	U.S. Treasury findings on recruitment for the RSF	Provision of specialised military services	Applicable sanctions, financial investigation and employment-related enforcement	Recruitment activity may adapt through successor organisations
Financial intermediation	Identified cross-border commercial relationships	Movement or settlement of funds supporting relevant activities	Beneficial-ownership analysis and lawful financial supervision	Payment records require context to establish military purpose
Transport and logistics	International supply relationships requiring movement of goods	Delivery and continuity of supplies	Customs enforcement and relevant transfer controls	Ordinary transport activity is not inherently unlawful
Mining-related industrial inputs	EU restrictions on mercury and cyanide	Potential influence on gold extraction	Product classification, export controls and associated services restrictions	Effects on production and revenues require separate measurement

Sources: U.S. Treasury Sudan Corporate Sanctions — June 2023; U.S. Treasury Procurement and Recruitment Sanctions — June 2026; Council of the EU Gold and Mining-Input Restrictions — July 2026.

The table distinguishes functions rather than estimating their relative financial importance. The record does not establish a sufficiently complete, harmonised set of audited transactions to calculate the proportion of total military expenditure financed through each category.

The United Nations Arms Embargo: Scope, Legal Authority and the Problem of Geographic Limitation

The Darfur embargo is not equivalent to a comprehensive prohibition on arms transfers throughout Sudan

One of the most consequential legal distinctions in Sudan’s international security architecture is the geographical scope of the United Nations arms embargo. The Security Council’s measures originated in the conflict in Darfur and were subsequently expanded and modified through additional resolutions. They do not automatically constitute a general prohibition on every arms transfer to Sudan regardless of recipient, destination or applicable exemption.

The Security Council initially adopted an embargo through Resolution 1556 (2004), directed against non-governmental entities and individuals, including the Janjaweed, operating in Darfur. Resolution 1591 (2005) expanded the relevant restrictions to include parties to the N’Djamena Ceasefire Agreement and other belligerents operating in Darfur. Later resolutions strengthened monitoring and end-user documentation requirements.

The Security Council’s official sanctions committee explains that states must prevent the supply of arms, related materiel and relevant technical training or assistance to actors operating in Darfur, subject to the provisions and exceptions established by the applicable resolutions. It also describes requirements concerning end-user documentation for arms transfers to Sudan not otherwise prohibited by the relevant measures. Security Council Committee Established Pursuant to Resolution 1591 (2005) Concerning Sudan — United Nations Security Council.

The geographical limitation creates a significant enforcement challenge. Military equipment may be obtained or held outside Darfur and subsequently transferred into the region. Determining whether a particular transaction violates the embargo can therefore require information concerning the recipient, final destination, transfer arrangements and the relevant activities of those involved.

An arms transfer that is not prohibited by the Darfur embargo may nonetheless be restricted by national export law, another applicable sanctions regime or binding international obligations. Conversely, the existence of a serious humanitarian crisis does not automatically create a universal legal embargo covering every category of arms transfer to the entire country.

The September 2026 renewal establishes an important temporal issue

On 11 September 2026, the Security Council adopted Resolution 2828 (2026), renewing the relevant sanctions measures until 9 October 2026 and extending the mandate of the Panel of Experts until 9 November 2026. Security Council Resolution 2828 (2026) — United Nations Security Council — September 2026.

The distinction between these dates is critical. The extension of a monitoring panel’s mandate is not the same legal act as extending the operative restrictions. A panel may possess a mandate extending beyond a specified expiry date for particular measures, depending on the provisions of the governing resolutions.

At the adopted report cut-off of 15 October 2026, the verified resolution record confirms the 9 October expiry date specified in Resolution 2828 but does not establish, from the instruments examined here, whether a further decision had renewed those measures after that date. Accordingly, the report cannot assert that the September resolution alone maintained the embargo beyond 9 October.

This is a consequential legal limit rather than a technicality. Whether a transfer is prohibited by a particular time-limited sanctions measure depends on the legally applicable provisions at the relevant date. Any enforcement assessment involving transactions after the stated expiry date must first establish the subsequent operative decision, if one exists.

Exemptions are part of the legal structure, not exceptions to legal compliance

The sanctions framework provides defined exemptions, including arrangements associated with authorised monitoring, verification or peace-support operations, specified non-lethal equipment for humanitarian or protective use, and certain protective clothing for relevant personnel.

The Security Council’s sanctions committee also identifies procedures through which the Government of Sudan may seek approval for movements of military equipment and supplies into Darfur where such approval is required. Arms Embargo Exemptions — Security Council Committee Established Pursuant to Resolution 1591 (2005).

These procedures matter because legal restrictions must distinguish prohibited military supply from permitted humanitarian, monitoring or protective activity. An enforcement system that ignores exemptions may obstruct operations that the Security Council intended to preserve.

Table 6.2 — United Nations Sudan Sanctions: Legal Instruments and Their Functions

Instrument	Date	Principal legal function	Geographic or institutional scope	Critical distinction
Resolution 1556	30 July 2004	Initial arms restrictions on non-governmental entities and individuals operating in Darfur	Darfur-related actors	Not a general worldwide arms embargo on every Sudanese recipient
Resolution 1591	29 March 2005	Expansion of embargo, sanctions committee, asset freeze and travel ban mechanisms	Darfur and qualifying actors	Embargo scope differs from the territorial reach of later domestic sanctions
Resolution 1945	14 October 2010	Strengthening of monitoring and end-user documentation requirements	Transfers covered by relevant Sudan measures	End-user documentation is an enforcement requirement, not proof of lawful use
Resolution 2035	17 February 2012	Modifications to exemptions and listing criteria	Applicable Sudan sanctions arrangements	Exemptions and designation provisions must be read precisely
Resolution 2664	9 December 2022	Humanitarian exemption applicable to UN asset-freeze regimes under its provisions	Relevant UN sanctions regimes	Asset-freeze humanitarian relief is distinct from arms-embargo exemptions
Resolution 2791	12 September 2025	Renewal of measures and extension of expert monitoring	Sudan/Darfur sanctions framework	Contains distinct expiry provisions
Resolution 2828	11 September 2026	Renewal of sanctions to 9 October 2026 and expert mandate to 9 November 2026	Existing Sudan sanctions framework	Panel mandate and sanctions expiration are not interchangeable

Official sources: Security Council Sudan Sanctions Committee; Security Council Resolution 1591 (2005); Security Council Resolution 2828 (2026); Security Council Sudan Sanctions Resolutions Register.

The Arms Trade Treaty: Export Prohibitions, Risk Assessment and Prevention of Diversion

The Arms Trade Treaty addresses state responsibilities rather than automatically outlawing every transfer to a non-state recipient

The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) establishes an international framework governing defined transfers of conventional arms within its scope. Its significance to Sudan lies in the obligations imposed upon states parties when authorising relevant exports and addressing the risk that equipment may be transferred or diverted to recipients involved in serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law.

The treaty’s application requires legal precision. It governs defined conventional arms categories and associated transfer activities; it does not automatically regulate every commercial component, civilian drone or technical service merely because that item could have military utility.

The legal analysis must begin with the item, the transfer activity, the state concerned and the treaty obligations binding that state.

Article 6 establishes prohibitions concerning transfers that would violate relevant Security Council measures, other applicable international obligations or specified circumstances involving knowledge that the arms would be used to commit certain international crimes.

Article 7 requires exporting states parties to assess relevant risks before authorising exports covered by that provision, including whether the arms could contribute to or undermine peace and security and whether they could be used to commit or facilitate serious violations. Where an overriding risk remains following consideration of possible mitigating measures, authorisation must be denied.

Article 11 concerns diversion and requires states parties involved in covered transfers to take measures to prevent relevant weapons from being diverted.

The ATT Secretariat has published implementation materials, including an updated voluntary guide concerning Articles 6 and 7 in September 2026. These materials assist implementation but must be distinguished from the binding treaty provisions themselves. Arms Trade Treaty Official Document Repository — Arms Trade Treaty Secretariat.

Risk assessment must be performed before authorisation, not reconstructed from later consequences alone

Export-risk assessment differs from determining criminal responsibility after an attack. It concerns the information available to competent authorities before a decision is taken and the legal standards governing that decision.

A state considering a relevant export should assess the nature of the proposed recipient, the intended end use, the risk of misuse and the possibility of diversion. Evidence of previous serious violations may be highly relevant, but the evaluation must also consider the proposed equipment and applicable legal framework.

The distinction between intended recipient and ultimate user is especially important where transactions involve intermediaries. A contractual purchaser may not be the organisation that eventually operates the equipment. End-user documentation can assist verification, but documentary declarations are not conclusive evidence that diversion will not occur.

Effective transfer governance requires attention to the full chain of responsibility, including authorisation, intermediary activity, delivery, subsequent transfer and relevant post-delivery information.

The ATT does not create a universal rule under which non-state actors are exempt from legal restrictions because they are not treaty parties. Rather, the treaty imposes obligations on states parties, while separate international and domestic legal regimes can bind individuals, companies and armed organisations.

Similarly, the fact that one state has not joined the ATT does not eliminate other obligations arising from Security Council resolutions, customary international law or applicable domestic legislation.

Classification of unmanned systems requires item-specific analysis

The proliferation of unmanned aircraft creates questions about whether particular platforms and associated equipment fall within relevant conventional-arms categories or national military export-control lists.

A military unmanned aircraft may be covered by applicable export controls, but a civilian commercially available aircraft should not automatically be treated as a covered ATT weapon without considering its technical characteristics and the applicable classification rules.

Components, software and technical services may be governed by national or regional dual-use and military export regimes even when they do not fall within the ATT’s defined conventional-arms categories.

This distinction has practical consequences. A lawful transaction involving civilian technology can become relevant to a military investigation where evidence establishes prohibited end use or diversion, but military utility alone does not prove that a particular export violated the treaty.

Table 6.3 — Arms Trade Treaty Obligations and Their Application to Sudan-Related Transactions

Treaty provision	Principal obligation	Sudan-related relevance	Necessary evidence	Limitation
Article 2	Defines relevant conventional-arms categories and transfer activities	Establishes whether the item and transaction fall within treaty scope	Technical classification and transaction documentation	Not every civilian UAV or component automatically falls within the treaty
Article 3	Addresses ammunition and munitions for covered conventional arms	Relevant to transfers of qualifying ammunition	Product and destination information	Scope must be established item by item
Article 4	Addresses parts and components in defined circumstances	Relevant to assembly and production involving covered weapons	Technical specifications and intended recipient	Does not create unlimited coverage of all dual-use goods
Article 6	Prohibits authorisation of transfers in specified circumstances	Relevant to embargoes and knowledge of intended criminal use	Applicable legal measures and evidence available to the exporting state	Requires a specific legal and factual assessment
Article 7	Requires export assessment and denial where the relevant threshold is met	Relevant to serious violation risks	Information on recipient, end use, risk and mitigation	A risk assessment is not interchangeable with a criminal conviction
Article 8	Addresses importing-state obligations, including relevant information provision	Supports end-use scrutiny	Competent import documentation	Documentation may not establish actual subsequent use
Article 9	Addresses transit and trans-shipment under applicable national law	Relevant to international transfer routes	Transport and jurisdictional information	Legal competence depends on national implementation
Article 10	Addresses brokering controls	Relevant to commercial intermediaries	Identity and activities of brokers	Coverage depends on treaty requirements and implementing law
Article 11	Requires measures to prevent diversion	Relevant to transfers through multiple recipients or jurisdictions	Transfer history, end-user information and diversion findings	Suspicion alone does not establish a completed diversion
Article 13	Establishes reporting obligations	Supports transparency concerning relevant transfers	Official state submissions	Public reports may contain permitted limitations and omissions

Treaty reference: The Arms Trade Treaty — Official Treaty and Implementation Repository.

The table is a legal classification framework. It does not conclude that a particular supplier violated the ATT merely because equipment manufactured in its jurisdiction appeared in Sudan.

International Humanitarian Law: Why Non-State Armed Organisations Remain Legally Bound

A non-state organisation’s lack of treaty-making capacity does not exempt it from humanitarian law

A fundamental legal error in some discussions of Sudan is the proposition that armed non-state organisations are not bound by international law because they are not states.

Organised armed groups participating in a non-international armed conflict are bound by applicable international humanitarian law, including Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and relevant customary rules. Depending on the circumstances and treaty requirements, additional provisions may apply.

These obligations regulate the treatment of civilians and persons not participating in hostilities, the conduct of attacks, protection of medical services and other matters. Serious violations can give rise to individual criminal responsibility where the applicable legal elements are satisfied.

The distinction between state responsibility and individual criminal responsibility remains important. A commander may bear responsibility for conduct under relevant international criminal-law standards, while attributing the same conduct to a foreign government requires separate application of rules concerning state responsibility.

The principles of distinction, proportionality and precautions apply to drone warfare

International humanitarian law does not permit attacks against civilians or civilian objects merely because a remote weapon system is used.

The principle of distinction requires differentiation between civilians and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives. Proportionality prohibits attacks expected to cause incidental civilian harm excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. Feasible precautions must be taken in the planning and execution of attacks.

A drone’s potential accuracy does not guarantee legal compliance. The legality of a particular attack depends on the military character of the objective, the information reasonably available, the anticipated civilian consequences and the precautions undertaken.

Attacks affecting hospitals, water infrastructure, electricity systems and other essential services require particular attention to the civilian population’s foreseeable dependence on those facilities. Damage to one installation may produce indirect effects on healthcare, sanitation or access to food.

The UN Security Council’s Darfur sanctions criteria recognise serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law as relevant to the designation of individuals and entities. Security Council Committee Established Pursuant to Resolution 1591 (2005) — Listing Criteria.

Criminal responsibility and sanctions designations are different legal processes

A sanctions designation may be based on criteria established by a competent authority and may restrict assets or travel. It does not automatically establish criminal guilt under international criminal law.

Similarly, allegations of genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes must be assessed according to the specific elements of each crime. The same act may give rise to several legal questions, but those questions cannot be resolved by substituting political statements for judicial findings.

The International Court of Justice’s May 2025 order in Sudan v. United Arab Emirates illustrates the importance of jurisdictional precision. The Court rejected Sudan’s request and removed the case because it found that it manifestly lacked jurisdiction under the applicable circumstances. It did not adjudicate the merits of the allegations regarding Emirati support. Application of the Genocide Convention in Sudan, Sudan v. United Arab Emirates, Order of 5 May 2025 — International Court of Justice — May 2025.

A jurisdictional decision cannot properly be cited as proof that the underlying conduct either occurred or did not occur. The distinction is indispensable for any report seeking to address foreign-state responsibility.

State Responsibility, Private Companies and the Attribution Problem

The involvement of private or state-associated companies creates complex questions concerning international responsibility. A company incorporated in a particular jurisdiction may conduct activities relevant to an armed conflict without those activities automatically being attributable to the government of the state of incorporation.

The legal assessment must distinguish corporate conduct, regulatory obligations, possible state direction or control and any separate duties of prevention or enforcement imposed by applicable international law.

Nationality, incorporation, financing and command are different relationships. A state may possess regulatory authority over a company without directing its operations. A company may conduct prohibited transactions without acting as an organ of the state. Conversely, conduct by private actors may become attributable to a state under applicable rules where the relevant legal conditions are met.

This distinction also affects sanctions policy. A government may be required to prevent or punish prohibited transactions by persons within its jurisdiction even where those transactions are not themselves attributable to the state as direct governmental conduct.

The January 2025 U.S. Treasury designations concerning UAE-based businesses associated with RSF support provide an example of the difference between official findings against identifiable companies and broader allegations of foreign-government responsibility. Treasury Sanctions Sudanese Paramilitary Leader, Weapons Supplier, and Related Companies — U.S. Department of the Treasury — January 2025.

The appropriate evidentiary standard depends on the conclusion being drawn. Establishing that a company supplied military equipment is not the same as demonstrating that a government ordered the supply. Establishing failure to enforce a regulatory obligation may require different evidence from proving direct participation in a military operation.

A decision-grade report must therefore distinguish the responsibilities of exporters, intermediaries, recipients, armed commanders and governments rather than treating them as a single category.

Sanctions Architecture: United Nations, European Union, United States and United Kingdom

The international sanctions environment affecting Sudan consists of overlapping legal systems with different territorial reach, designation criteria, prohibited activities and enforcement institutions. The existence of these systems does not establish a single universal sanctions regime.

The United Nations framework creates obligations for member states within the scope of operative Security Council decisions. European Union regulations establish directly applicable restrictions within their defined legal reach. United States measures operate through relevant U.S. sanctions authorities, while the United Kingdom maintains a distinct domestic framework.

These differences matter when companies or financial institutions engage in cross-border transactions. An activity may be prohibited under one jurisdiction’s rules while requiring separate assessment under another. The legal status of a transaction cannot be determined solely through the existence of a Sudan-related designation in a foreign sanctions list.

The U.S. Treasury’s 26 June 2026 action against eight individuals and entities demonstrates the use of targeted financial measures against military procurement and personnel recruitment networks. The department identified arrangements supporting both principal Sudanese belligerents and linked their activities to the continuation of hostilities. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

The European Union’s July 2026 commodity measures represent a different regulatory approach because they restrict defined economic activities rather than relying exclusively on individually designated persons and entities. The United Kingdom’s separate Sudan sanctions framework, meanwhile, includes financial and other restrictions implemented through its domestic legislation. Sudan: List of Designations and Sanctions Notices — United Kingdom Government.

An effective international enforcement strategy must recognise these differences while improving cooperation among competent authorities.

Table 6.4 — Comparative Sanctions and Arms-Transfer Governance

Legal framework	Competent authority	Principal mechanism	Geographic or jurisdictional reach	Strategic limitation
UN Sudan/Darfur sanctions	UN Security Council and 1591 Committee	Arms restrictions, targeted asset freezes, travel bans and monitoring	Scope established by operative Security Council decisions	Requires legally effective measures and implementation by states
EU Sudan restrictive measures	Council of the EU and national competent authorities	Individual designations and defined economic prohibitions	EU legal jurisdiction and the applicable territorial and personal scope	Enforcement varies with national capacity and international cooperation
U.S. Sudan sanctions	U.S. Treasury/OFAC and relevant federal authorities	Designations, financial restrictions and associated prohibitions	Applicable U.S. jurisdiction, including relevant transactions and persons	Corporate adaptation and alternative channels may reduce effectiveness
UK Sudan sanctions	UK government and competent enforcement authorities	Asset freezes, travel and trade-related restrictions	Applicable UK legal jurisdiction	Requires sustained investigative and compliance capacity
Arms Trade Treaty	States parties and national export-control authorities	Export prohibitions, risk assessment and diversion prevention	Transfers and obligations within treaty scope	Does not automatically regulate every civilian or dual-use technology
National export-control systems	Competent licensing and customs authorities	Licensing, end-use requirements and enforcement	National legislation and applicable international obligations	Divergent classifications and enforcement practices
International humanitarian law	Parties to armed conflict and relevant accountability institutions	Rules regulating hostilities and protection of persons	Applicable armed conflicts	Enforcement difficulties do not eliminate substantive obligations

Sources: UN Security Council Sudan Sanctions Committee; Council of the European Union Sudan Measures — July 2026; U.S. Treasury Sudan Sanctions — June 2026; UK Sudan Sanctions Guidance; Arms Trade Treaty Official Repository.

The Humanitarian Consequences of Economic Restrictions

Sanctions and trade controls intended to constrain military financing can produce unintended consequences if their scope, exemptions and implementation procedures are not sufficiently clear.

Financial institutions may restrict transactions beyond those legally prohibited because of uncertainty concerning ownership or exposure. Commercial operators may withdraw from markets where compliance is difficult. Humanitarian organisations may encounter delays in payments, procurement or transportation even when their activities are permitted.

The existence of a humanitarian exemption does not guarantee that the relevant financial or commercial transaction can be completed in practice. Institutions may still require documentation, legal review and sufficient confidence that the activity falls within the applicable provisions.

These implementation difficulties create a distinction between the legal availability of an exemption and its operational accessibility.

The United Nations Security Council established a humanitarian exemption to relevant asset-freeze measures through Resolution 2664 (2022). The relationship between that exemption and individual sanctions regimes must be interpreted according to the operative provisions and subsequent decisions. United Nations Security Council Sudan Sanctions Committee — Exemptions and Measures.

For Sudan, the policy challenge is particularly acute because economic activity already operates under severe pressures arising from conflict, damaged infrastructure and displacement. Financial restrictions may complicate an environment in which humanitarian organisations and civilian businesses face limited institutional capacity.

Measures directed against conflict financing should therefore be accompanied by accessible guidance, lawful authorisation mechanisms and monitoring of unintended civilian consequences.

This does not mean that humanitarian concerns invalidate sanctions. It means that humanitarian impact must be incorporated into their design and implementation.

The Effectiveness Problem: Why Designations Are Not Equivalent to Military Degradation

International authorities frequently report sanctions activity through the number of designated individuals and companies. These figures are administratively relevant, but they do not provide a complete measure of strategic effectiveness.

A designation is a legal action; the interruption of military capability is a possible consequence requiring separate verification.

A company may lose access to particular financial institutions while continuing some operations elsewhere. An armed organisation may substitute another supplier or draw upon existing inventories. Technical personnel may train local replacements before losing access to their original contractual arrangements.

Conversely, a carefully targeted restriction affecting a difficult-to-replace service could impose substantial operational costs even where only a small number of entities are designated.

The decisive variables concern the function affected, the recipient’s degree of dependence, the availability of substitutes and the duration of the interruption.

A rigorous evaluation should therefore assess whether the measure disrupted the relevant transaction, reduced access to a critical resource, changed the cost or reliability of procurement and ultimately affected the recipient’s capacity to sustain prohibited activities.

Table 6.5 — Measuring Sanctions Effectiveness Without Artificial Scores

Evaluation stage	Observable evidence	Interpretation	Principal limitation
Legal implementation	Adoption and entry into force of relevant measures	Confirms the existence of restrictions	Does not establish compliance
Identification of prohibited activity	Verified transactions, entities and goods	Supports enforcement targeting	Incomplete records can distort conclusions
Transaction disruption	Confirmed refusal, freezing, seizure or cancellation under applicable law	Demonstrates a direct enforcement effect	Individual transactions may be replaced
Network disruption	Closure or material impairment of documented support functions	Indicates possible systemic impact	Organisational adaptation may restore capability
Military-resource reduction	Verified decrease in accessible equipment, services or financing	Connects enforcement to military sustainability	Requires information often unavailable publicly
Behavioural change	Demonstrable alteration of procurement or military conduct	Indicates potential strategic influence	Other military and political factors may contribute
Civilian consequences	Changes in humanitarian access, prices and lawful commercial activity	Identifies unintended effects	Requires credible comparison with pre-existing conditions

The framework should be applied to particular legal measures rather than to the sanctions system as an undifferentiated whole.

Policy Options: Restricting Military Resources Without Undermining Civilian Recovery

An effective response to Sudan’s war economy requires instruments matched to identifiable economic and legal mechanisms. Broad rhetorical commitments cannot substitute for the documentation required to establish prohibited transactions or attribute responsibility.

First, competent national authorities should strengthen evidence-based enforcement against identified military procurement and recruitment networks. This would require cooperation among financial supervisors, customs institutions, export-control authorities and relevant investigative bodies. The expected effect would be to increase the difficulty of obtaining prohibited resources and services. The principal limitation is the possibility of substitution through alternative organisations or jurisdictions.

Second, international authorities should improve the verification of end users and subsequent transfers. Where relevant equipment falls within the scope of arms-transfer controls, licensing decisions should address credible information about the recipient, destination and diversion risk. This may require cooperation with transit and importing states, but enforcement must remain consistent with applicable legal authority.

Third, the European Union and other relevant jurisdictions should monitor the practical effects of Sudan-related commodity restrictions. The objective should be to determine whether prohibited transactions decline and whether legitimate civilian commerce experiences unintended disruption. The July 2026 gold measures provide a defined regulatory basis for this work.

Fourth, humanitarian authorisations and exemptions should be accompanied by workable administrative procedures. Organisations conducting lawful relief operations need predictable access to banking, procurement and transportation services. Removing unnecessary uncertainty can preserve humanitarian effectiveness without weakening restrictions against prohibited military activity.

Fifth, international monitoring should distinguish enforcement outputs from conflict outcomes. The number of designations, investigations or announcements should not be used as a proxy for reduced military activity. Where information permits, evaluation should examine access to critical resources and changes in the behaviour of relevant armed organisations.

Table 6.6 — Strategic Policy Options and Implementation Consequences

Course of action	Competent authority	Intended effect	Time-to-effect	Implementation burden	Principal risk
Target verified procurement facilitators	National sanctions and investigative authorities	Disrupt identifiable prohibited support functions	Months, depending on evidence and procedure	Investigations, legal review and international cooperation	Replacement networks and indirect civilian effects
Strengthen end-user verification	Export-control and customs authorities	Reduce unauthorised diversion	Before authorisation and through subsequent monitoring	Technical expertise and documentation	Administrative delay and incomplete information
Coordinate financial enforcement	Financial-intelligence and supervisory authorities	Improve identification of prohibited flows	Months to years	Information sharing and legal cooperation	Inconsistent jurisdictional coverage
Evaluate EU gold restrictions	EU institutions and national enforcement authorities	Assess effects on conflict-related trade	Months to years	Trade data and compliance monitoring	Market substitution and unintended harm to lawful commerce
Improve humanitarian licensing guidance	Competent national and regional authorities	Preserve lawful relief operations	Potentially immediate once implemented	Legal clarification and institutional coordination	Excessively restrictive private-sector compliance
Strengthen UN monitoring	Security Council and mandated expert mechanisms	Improve evidence concerning embargo violations	Dependent on mandate and access	Expert capacity, cooperation and reporting	Incomplete access and limits of enforcement authority
Support civilian economic recovery	National and international development actors	Reduce dependence on conflict-related economic arrangements	Years	Governance, finance and physical security	Resources may be captured where oversight is inadequate

Key Judgments — Chapter 6

Sudan’s war economy consists of overlapping military, industrial, commercial and financial structures. Its analysis requires identifying particular beneficiaries and transactions rather than treating the entire national economy as a uniform source of military financing.

Gold has become an important focus of international economic restrictions. The EU’s July 2026 measures introduce defined prohibitions affecting Sudanese-origin gold and specified mining-related goods, but their effectiveness depends on implementation and the availability of reliable trade evidence.

The United Nations Darfur arms embargo possesses a specific legal scope. It should not be described as a comprehensive prohibition on every arms transfer to Sudan. The distinction between the sanctions expiry date and the expert panel’s mandate is particularly important for assessments made after 9 October 2026.

The Arms Trade Treaty provides binding rules for states parties within its defined scope. It does not automatically prohibit all transfers involving unmanned aircraft or every commercial transaction with a non-state organisation.

Non-state armed groups remain bound by applicable international humanitarian law. Their lack of statehood does not exempt them from prohibitions against attacks on civilians or from other relevant obligations.

Private corporate activity and state responsibility must be assessed separately. A sanctions finding concerning a company registered in a foreign country does not automatically establish direct governmental responsibility for the company’s conduct.

The effectiveness of sanctions must be measured through demonstrated disruption and behavioural consequences. Designations and regulatory announcements are legal outputs, not independently verified reductions in military capability.

Humanitarian exemptions and lawful civilian commerce are essential components of responsible sanctions implementation. Measures that inadvertently obstruct emergency assistance may worsen civilian conditions without achieving their intended security objectives.

What Would Change the Assessment — Chapter 6

The assessment of international economic leverage would strengthen if competent authorities documented sustained disruption of the procurement, recruitment and financing functions identified in official investigations. Evidence of successful substitution through other commercial or financial structures would instead indicate limits to existing enforcement.

A more precise legal assessment of the United Nations arms embargo after 9 October 2026 requires confirmation of any subsequent Security Council decision concerning the continuation or modification of the measures. The expert panel’s separate mandate cannot substitute for that verification.

The effectiveness of EU commodity restrictions would become clearer through official records concerning implementation, prohibited transactions, relevant trade flows and effects on legitimate civilian activity.

Finally, investigations establishing the origin, authorisation, recipients and ultimate use of particular military equipment could materially change conclusions concerning violations of export controls, sanctions or international humanitarian law. These findings must distinguish private commercial responsibility from state-attributable conduct.

Final Strategic Assessment of Chapter 6

Sudan’s economic warfare demonstrates that the continuation of armed conflict depends upon institutions and commercial relationships extending far beyond the immediate battlefield. Military organisations require financing, procurement, personnel, technical services and access to systems capable of replacing or sustaining their resources. The internationalisation of these functions creates vulnerabilities that lawful sanctions and export controls can address, but it also produces opportunities for substitution and regulatory evasion.

The central policy problem is therefore one of precision, institutional coordination and enforceable legal responsibility. Restrictions must identify the relevant activities, apply the correct legal framework and establish evidentiary connections between commercial conduct and prohibited military support. They must also preserve the humanitarian activities and civilian economic functions necessary for the population’s survival.

A policy concerned exclusively with expanding sanctions lists may generate administrative activity without altering the operational resources available to armed actors. Equally, a general prohibition lacking clear scope or workable exemptions could impose substantial civilian costs while producing uncertain military effects.

The most defensible strategy is a coordinated system of targeted economic enforcement, arms-transfer risk assessment, diversion prevention, civilian protection and reliable monitoring of actual outcomes.

The combined findings of Chapters 5 and 6 establish the governing conclusion of Pillar II: Sudan’s conflict has become a regional and international security problem not simply because foreign actors possess interests in its outcome, but because the movement of people, commercial resources, military expertise and financial relationships connects the continuation of warfare to institutions operating across multiple jurisdictions. The principal requirement for international policy is to govern those connections lawfully and effectively while preventing the humanitarian and economic consequences of the conflict from creating additional instability beyond Sudan.

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Chapter 7. Strategic Implications for Italy, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union and NATO

Sudan as a European Strategic Security Problem: From Humanitarian Responsibility to Economic, Maritime and Institutional Exposure

Sudan’s continuing destabilisation presents Europe with a multidimensional strategic challenge in which humanitarian emergency, regional insecurity, maritime trade, military technology proliferation and international financial governance increasingly interact. Although the conflict does not constitute a direct military threat to the territorial integrity of European states, its consequences extend into areas central to European security policy: the reliability of maritime connections between Europe and Asia, the stability of countries linking the Sahel to the Mediterranean, the effectiveness of international sanctions, the integrity of defence-related supply chains and the ability of European governments to influence conflicts sustained by external military assistance.

The principal European vulnerability does not derive from Sudan’s geographical distance or proximity alone. It emerges from the combination of strategic interdependence and limited political control. European governments possess extensive financial, diplomatic, humanitarian and maritime-security instruments, yet they cannot independently determine the behaviour of Sudan’s belligerents or the policies of all external actors capable of influencing the conflict. Consequently, the European response must operate through several institutional systems with different legal competences, political priorities and implementation capacities.

The European Union can adopt restrictive measures, finance humanitarian assistance and coordinate diplomatic positions. Individual member states retain significant responsibilities for national intelligence, criminal enforcement, military operations and bilateral diplomacy. The United Kingdom operates through a separate sanctions framework and possesses distinctive diplomatic responsibilities at the United Nations Security Council. NATO provides a collective defence and security-cooperation framework but does not possess an automatic mandate to intervene in Sudan. The African Union and African regional organisations remain indispensable political actors whose authority and ownership must be respected.

The practical importance of these institutional distinctions became evident during the Third International Sudan Conference held in Berlin on 15 April 2026, organised by Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, the African Union and the European Union. According to the official conference communiqué, representatives of 55 states, numerous international organisations and 38 international and Sudanese nongovernmental organisations participated. The meeting combined humanitarian financing with political engagement, support for Sudanese civilian actors and calls for an end to external military assistance sustaining the conflict.

The organisers reported approximately €1.5 billion in international humanitarian commitments, including more than €811 million from the European Union and its member states, while emphasising that humanitarian access must not be made conditional upon reaching a ceasefire agreement. The conference also supported the African Union-led Quintet’s efforts to facilitate an inclusive Sudanese political dialogue. Co-Host Communiqué — International Sudan Conference Berlin — German Federal Foreign Office — April 2026.

This diplomatic architecture is particularly revealing. It demonstrates that the European response is already structured around three partially overlapping objectives: preventing further humanitarian deterioration, increasing pressure on the economic and political mechanisms sustaining the war, and preserving the conditions for a future Sudanese-led political settlement. Yet these objectives operate on different timescales. Emergency humanitarian financing may be mobilised within months, while the reconstruction of institutional authority or the disruption of complex military procurement systems can require years of sustained cooperation.

The need for a more integrated European strategy became even clearer on 21 September 2026, when the African Union, European Union, France, Germany, United Kingdom and United States convened a further ministerial meeting in New York to coordinate de-escalation efforts and support an inclusive Sudanese political dialogue. The joint statement described approximately 33 million people requiring assistance and more than 20 million facing acute food insecurity, underscoring the continuing discrepancy between the scale of the crisis and the capacity of existing political mechanisms to contain it. Co-Chairs’ Statement on Coordinating De-Escalation and Supporting Inter-Sudanese Dialogue — French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs — September 2026.

These figures describe a humanitarian emergency, but their strategic implications extend beyond relief operations. Prolonged displacement places pressure on neighbouring countries’ public services and administrative capacity. The deterioration of legitimate economic activity increases dependence on emergency assistance and informal markets. Persistent armed fragmentation complicates the restoration of transport, energy and financial infrastructure. At the same time, international diplomatic institutions must devote increasing resources to preventing the crisis from producing additional regional instability.

The European strategic problem is therefore not whether Sudan should be treated as a humanitarian or security priority. It is how to construct a policy capable of addressing both dimensions without allowing emergency relief to become a substitute for political strategy or military-security concerns to undermine civilian protection.

The Economic Geography of Europe’s Exposure: The Red Sea, Suez Connectivity and the Difference Between Direct and Indirect Risk

Sudan’s position on the western shore of the Red Sea gives the conflict a significance that cannot be inferred solely from its domestic economic size. The Red Sea forms part of the maritime system connecting the Mediterranean and European ports with the Indian Ocean, the Gulf and Asian manufacturing economies. Disruption along this corridor can influence shipping schedules, transport costs, inventories and the reliability of industrial supply chains far beyond the immediate area of insecurity.

However, analytical precision requires distinguishing Sudan-originating risks from the existing maritime-security crisis involving attacks against commercial shipping elsewhere in the Red Sea region. These phenomena occur within the same wider geographical system but are not causally identical. The existence of drone warfare inside Sudan does not establish that Sudanese belligerents are conducting attacks against international merchant shipping, nor does it establish that all current Red Sea shipping disruptions originate in Sudan.

The European Union’s maritime operation EUNAVFOR ASPIDES illustrates the distinction. Established in February 2024, ASPIDES has a defensive mandate directed towards the protection of commercial vessels and crews in the Red Sea and surrounding maritime areas. Its primary operational framework arose from threats to freedom of navigation associated with the wider Red Sea security crisis rather than from a mandate to intervene in Sudan’s civil war.

On 24 August 2026, the European External Action Service reported that ASPIDES had supported the safe transit of more than 2,390 merchant vessels since its launch and provided close protection to more than 720 ships. These are cumulative operational activity indicators, not figures representing the number of attacks prevented or the proportion of all shipping traffic protected. EUNAVFOR ASPIDES Mandate and Operational Activity — European External Action Service — August 2026.

The relevance to Sudan lies in the possibility of additional instability affecting coastal infrastructure, humanitarian access, commercial confidence and regional security coordination. If insecurity were to spread towards facilities supporting trade and international transport, the consequences would depend on the affected location, the duration of disruption, the availability of alternative routes and the capacity of authorities to restore reliable operations.

European exposure is therefore better understood through critical connectivity and resilience than through assumptions of an imminent regional maritime blockade. The deterioration of security in Sudan can increase political and commercial uncertainty within an already sensitive maritime environment without necessarily producing a measurable increase in attacks against shipping.

For European governments, the priority should be to distinguish confirmed maritime incidents, verified threats to Sudanese coastal infrastructure and broader regional risk assessments. Combining them into a single undifferentiated security indicator would overstate the evidence and could produce inappropriate military or commercial responses.

Table 7.1 — European Strategic Exposure: Verified Baseline and Transmission Mechanisms

Strategic dimension	Verified indicator or institutional baseline	Reference period	Mechanism of European exposure	Principal analytical limitation
Humanitarian pressure	Approximately 33.7 million people in Sudan requiring assistance	2026 humanitarian planning	Humanitarian financing, regional partnerships and long-term stabilisation requirements	Humanitarian needs estimates are not direct measurements of European migration
Food insecurity	More than 20 million people facing acute food insecurity	September 2026 ministerial statement	Increasing dependence on humanitarian delivery and cross-border assistance	Food insecurity does not establish a predictable migration volume
International diplomacy	Representatives of 55 states at the Berlin Conference	April 2026	Multilateral coordination and diplomatic coalition-building	Participation does not establish agreement on coercive enforcement measures
Humanitarian commitments	Approximately €1.5 billion announced at Berlin	April 2026	Financing emergency relief in Sudan and neighbouring countries	Announced commitments must be distinguished from disbursements
EU and member-state conference commitments	More than €811 million	April 2026	European financing and regional humanitarian responsibilities	Aggregated commitments may contain different budget periods and implementing channels
Maritime security activity	More than 2,390 vessels supported by ASPIDES; more than 720 closely protected	Cumulative to August 2026	Protection of commercial navigation through the wider Red Sea system	These figures are not attributable to Sudan’s conflict
Financial restrictions	EU ban targeting Sudanese-origin gold and specified mining chemicals	July 2026	Restrictions on transactions associated with the war economy	Effectiveness depends on implementation and trade traceability
UK sanctions enforcement	11 new Sudan-related designations recorded on 16 July 2026	July 2026	Financial and commercial restrictions under UK law	Designations do not quantify assets frozen or transactions prevented

Official sources: Berlin International Sudan Conference Communiqué — April 2026; European Commission Sudan Humanitarian Response — 2026; EUNAVFOR ASPIDES Operational Update — August 2026; Council of the European Union, Sudan Gold Restrictions — July 2026; UK Sudan Sanctions Designation Notices — July 2026.

The figures describe different institutional activities and cannot be aggregated into a single measure of European exposure. Maritime operations, humanitarian commitments and sanctions designations address separate risks and have different indicators of effectiveness.

Italy: Mediterranean Strategic Depth, Red Sea Connectivity and the Security–Humanitarian Nexus

Italy’s exposure is determined by geographical interdependence rather than direct military involvement

Italy has a distinctive strategic interest in Sudan because instability in northeastern Africa intersects with three areas central to Italian foreign and security policy: Mediterranean stability, Red Sea commercial connectivity and the management of humanitarian pressures across the wider African neighbourhood. These interests require a different policy emphasis from that of states whose Sudan engagement is principally defined by international diplomatic leadership or development financing. Italy’s exposure is not confined to a single bilateral relationship; it emerges from the cumulative effects of regional instability on transport systems, humanitarian operations, commercial activity and partnerships with governments located between the Horn of Africa and the Mediterranean.

The Red Sea is particularly important to Italy because it forms part of the maritime connection between the Suez Canal and the Indian Ocean. Italian commercial ports and industrial supply chains benefit from reliable access to this corridor, especially where production and distribution networks depend upon timely movement of intermediate goods and finished products. Disruptions in the wider Red Sea environment can lengthen delivery routes, alter shipping schedules and increase the working capital required to maintain industrial inventories.

These consequences are not unique to Italy, but the composition of the Italian economy creates particular sensitivities. Manufacturing enterprises operating through internationally distributed supply chains may face constraints when transport reliability deteriorates. Delayed intermediate components can affect production schedules, while changes in freight arrangements can influence cash flow, delivery obligations and commercial competitiveness.

Nevertheless, a rigorous assessment must avoid attributing existing Suez-related commercial disruption directly to Sudan without supporting evidence. The relevant strategic conclusion is narrower: instability affecting Sudan’s coastal access and national infrastructure would constitute an additional risk within an already vulnerable maritime environment.

Italy’s security interests also extend towards the Horn of Africa, where political stability, regional maritime activity and cooperation with partner governments contribute to a broader Mediterranean security framework. This does not mean that conflict in Sudan automatically generates direct security threats against Italy. It means that the deterioration of governance and economic conditions in northeastern Africa can increase the complexity of regional policies that Italy must manage through diplomatic, humanitarian and security instruments.

The Italy for Sudan initiative provides a measurable operational baseline

Italy’s humanitarian engagement has acquired a clearly documented operational dimension through the Italy for Sudan initiative, launched by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.

The programme began operationally on 25 December 2025, when an initial humanitarian flight delivered approximately 25 tonnes of essential supplies to Port Sudan, intended to support 2,500 students. Subsequent operations involved further deliveries of food, shelter equipment and essential household supplies. The programme was designed to combine governmental action with the participation of humanitarian organisations and civil society. Italy for Sudan — Italy’s Humanitarian Commitment — Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation — April 2026.

On 14 May 2026, the Italian Foreign Ministry reported an additional delivery of approximately 70 tonnes of humanitarian supplies distributed through Port Sudan. The shipment included tents, waterproof coverings, mosquito nets, mattresses, water containers, kitchen equipment and hygiene kits, intended for 4,245 displaced families across 31 camps in Red Sea State.

The ministry also reported that the initiative had mobilised more than 130 tonnes of humanitarian assistance and over €6 million in emergency-related contributions since its launch. These figures establish the scale reported by the Italian government at that date; they should not be interpreted as Italy’s total humanitarian expenditure throughout the entire conflict or as evidence of the number of people whose needs were fully satisfied. Sudan: Arrival of Additional Humanitarian Aid under the Italy for Sudan Initiative — Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation — May 2026.

The programme demonstrates an important Italian comparative advantage: the capacity to combine diplomatic engagement, logistical coordination and concrete humanitarian assistance through established national institutions. Its strategic significance, however, depends on more than the total weight of supplies delivered. Humanitarian operations must also be evaluated against the accessibility of affected populations, the continuity of distribution, the security of implementing partners and the extent to which relief contributes to longer-term resilience.

A shipment can be successfully delivered without establishing that assistance will remain available to its intended beneficiaries over time. Similarly, emergency provision of shelter or water containers does not replace the reconstruction of local service networks. This distinction matters because Italy’s strategic objective should not be reduced to the efficient delivery of supplies. It should encompass the capacity to sustain assistance while supporting the eventual restoration of civilian infrastructure and stable administration.

Italy’s policy challenge is the integration of humanitarian diplomacy and strategic risk management

Italian policy would benefit from differentiating three operational levels. The first concerns immediate humanitarian delivery, where the Foreign Ministry and development-cooperation institutions possess established responsibilities. The second concerns regional diplomatic engagement, particularly with European and African partners involved in Sudanese mediation and refugee assistance. The third concerns the monitoring of risks affecting Italian commercial and security interests, including supply-chain exposure, shipping continuity and compliance with European restrictive measures.

These functions should support one another without becoming institutionally indistinguishable. Humanitarian actors require neutrality and safe access, while security authorities may pursue intelligence or enforcement objectives that operate under different legal rules. Protecting this distinction is necessary to preserve confidence in humanitarian activity.

A further consideration is migration policy. Sudanese displacement creates serious pressure on neighbouring countries, but displacement figures cannot be converted directly into forecasts of arrivals in Italy. Migration outcomes depend on border regimes, financial resources, family networks, security conditions, available legal pathways and developments in intermediate states. A defensible Italian strategy should therefore treat instability in Sudan as a factor affecting regional migration pressures, not as a numerical predictor of Mediterranean arrivals.

The most credible approach would integrate assistance to displaced populations with support for the countries hosting them, particularly where overstretched public services create additional instability. Such cooperation should be evaluated through measurable improvements in health, education, protection and access to essential services rather than assumptions about the number of future journeys prevented.

Table 7.2 — Italy: Documented Commitments, Strategic Responsibilities and Policy Options

Policy area	Documented baseline	Responsible institutions or framework	Recommended strategic direction	Implementation and evaluation
Humanitarian assistance	More than 130 tonnes mobilised and over €6 million in emergency contributions by May 2026	Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Italian Cooperation and humanitarian partners	Maintain targeted assistance while improving continuity and access	Track verified deliveries, distribution coverage and sustained availability of services
Emergency shelter	Assistance intended for 4,245 displaced families across 31 camps	Italy for Sudan and implementing organisations	Link emergency shelter provision to water, sanitation and protection needs	Assess operational conditions at recipient sites rather than shipment tonnage alone
Maritime connectivity	Italy depends on wider Mediterranean–Red Sea commercial routes	National maritime authorities and relevant EU operations	Strengthen maritime situational awareness and commercial contingency planning	Monitor shipping delays, route changes and verified security incidents
Industrial resilience	Exposure through international logistics and critical inputs	National economic institutions, companies and European frameworks	Improve risk assessment of concentrated transport and supply dependencies	Use sector-specific delivery and inventory data
Humanitarian diplomacy	Participation within wider European and international engagement	Foreign Ministry and EU diplomatic mechanisms	Reinforce Sudanese civilian participation and coordination with African institutions	Assess access agreements and the implementation of diplomatic commitments
Migration-related regional stability	Sudanese displacement places pressure on neighbouring countries	Italian and EU cooperation frameworks	Support host-country capacity and lawful protection systems	Measure protection outcomes without attributing all migration changes to Sudan
Sanctions compliance	EU restrictive measures apply within their defined legal scope	National competent authorities and EU institutions	Improve commercially relevant due diligence	Assess licensing, enforcement and verified evasion findings

The humanitarian baseline is documented in the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ May 2026 Operational Update. The wider European framework is established in the Council of the European Union’s July 2026 Restrictive Measures.

Italy’s principal strategic opportunity is to combine operational humanitarian credibility with a more systematic European approach to Red Sea connectivity, host-country resilience and the protection of legitimate economic activity. The central risk would be treating Sudan primarily through the separate lenses of aid delivery, commercial transport or migration without recognising that prolonged political fragmentation can affect all three simultaneously.

France: African Security Relationships, United Nations Diplomacy and the Political Contest over Regional Stability

France’s distinctive exposure lies in diplomatic responsibility and African strategic relationships

France’s approach to Sudan is shaped by its position as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, its diplomatic relationships across Africa and its involvement in efforts to coordinate international responses to the conflict. Unlike Italy, whose exposure includes significant Mediterranean-commercial considerations, France confronts Sudan as part of a wider question concerning the effectiveness of African political institutions, the resilience of regional security arrangements and the capacity of international diplomacy to influence armed conflicts involving external suppliers.

France has an interest in preventing Sudan’s war from further destabilising neighbouring states and weakening the international mechanisms through which African governments and regional institutions address conflicts. This is especially relevant where insecurity affects Chad and the wider Sahel, although the specific cross-border military and political pathways must be evaluated separately from the broader French strategic position.

France’s involvement has an established diplomatic chronology. On 15 April 2024, Paris hosted an international humanitarian conference concerning Sudan and neighbouring countries, organised with Germany and the European Union. President Emmanuel Macron announced that participants had mobilised more than €2 billion in commitments, compared with approximately €190 million identified before the conference. These were international pledges, not a measurement of French national expenditure or verified cumulative disbursements. Closing of the International Humanitarian Conference for Sudan and Neighbouring Countries — Presidency of the French Republic — April 2024.

The Paris conference established an important political function for France: the ability to convene international partners and maintain Sudan within a multilateral diplomatic agenda despite competition for political attention and humanitarian financing. This role was subsequently reinforced by France’s participation in the Berlin conference in April 2026 and the ministerial coordination meeting in New York in September 2026.

The continuity of this engagement is significant because high-level conferences are often criticised for generating pledges without sufficiently altering the conditions of conflict. Their strategic value depends on whether they produce sustained donor coordination, improve humanitarian access or create credible incentives for de-escalation.

France’s position must therefore be evaluated through two separate outcomes: its capacity to mobilise diplomatic participation and its capacity, together with international partners, to influence developments on the ground. The former is demonstrated by repeated official conferences; the latter requires evidence of implemented agreements, reduced violence and effective humanitarian access.

The Sahel and Chad create a security dimension distinct from direct intervention in Sudan

France’s relationships in Africa make developments around Sudan’s western frontiers particularly relevant. Instability affecting Chad can influence the security and humanitarian environment of a state already operating within a complex regional context. The movement of displaced populations, pressure on public services and the possible expansion of armed networks can create overlapping challenges for local authorities and international partners.

However, the fact that France maintains important relationships with African states does not establish that French forces should or will participate in military operations connected to Sudan. The relevant policy tools include diplomatic engagement, humanitarian assistance, support for regional organisations and cooperation consistent with existing bilateral and international legal frameworks.

France must also balance the protection of regional security interests with the principle of African ownership. Policies that appear to substitute external strategic priorities for the decisions of African institutions risk weakening the legitimacy of the very partnerships they are intended to support.

The African Union’s participation as a co-organiser of the Berlin conference and in subsequent international coordination mechanisms offers a more defensible basis for French engagement than independently constructing a security response dominated by European states.

France’s political influence depends on the relationship between diplomacy and accountability

France can contribute through its permanent membership of the Security Council, its capacity to support investigative and accountability processes and its participation in European sanctions decision-making. These tools are consequential but not unlimited. Security Council action depends on the positions of other members, while European restrictive measures operate through legal procedures that require agreement and implementation.

France’s most useful role may therefore be to connect political mediation with accountability and humanitarian protection rather than treating them as competing priorities. A settlement that stops immediate fighting but fails to provide credible safeguards for affected populations risks perpetuating grievances and creating incentives for renewed armed mobilisation.

The official French position in September 2026 supported a civilian and inclusive Sudanese-led political dialogue, coordinated through African and international structures. This indicates a diplomatic preference for a political settlement that extends beyond agreements among military commanders. Co-Chairs’ Statement on Coordinating De-Escalation and Supporting Inter-Sudanese Dialogue — France Diplomatie — September 2026.

Table 7.3 — France: Diplomatic Instruments and Strategic Trade-Offs

Strategic function	Documented baseline	Potential advantage	Principal constraint	Policy implication
International diplomatic mobilisation	Paris conference mobilised more than €2 billion in international commitments in April 2024	Convening power and political visibility	Pledges do not automatically translate into disbursement or access	Track fulfilment and effectiveness of commitments
Security Council participation	France holds permanent membership	Ability to shape negotiations and propose institutional measures	Agreement among Council members cannot be presumed	Build proposals around achievable diplomatic coalitions
African regional relations	France maintains diplomatic relationships with Sudan and relevant neighbouring states	Political channels for regional coordination	Diverging national interests and sensitivity to external intervention	Support African-led conflict resolution
European sanctions policy	Participation in EU Council decisions	Influence over common restrictive measures	Collective decision-making and evidence requirements	Pursue legally supportable, targeted measures
Humanitarian diplomacy	Participation in Paris, Berlin and New York processes	Continuity of political engagement	Humanitarian needs exceed the influence of any one donor	Link financing with access and protection outcomes
Civilian political dialogue	September 2026 co-chair support for inclusive Sudanese dialogue	Potential to support a settlement beyond military elites	Fragmented civilian representation and continuing hostilities	Strengthen legitimate, inclusive consultation mechanisms
Regional security	Concern over instability affecting Chad and the wider Sahel	Ability to coordinate with regional institutions	Direct causality and intervention requirements must be established	Prioritise documented threats and host-state consent

Sources: French Presidency — April 2024 Conference; Third International Sudan Conference — France Diplomatie — April 2026; September 2026 Ministerial Coordination Statement — France Diplomatie.

France’s central challenge is converting sustained diplomatic participation into measurable reductions in conflict-related insecurity. Its comparative advantage lies in the combination of Security Council membership, established African relationships and participation in European diplomatic mechanisms. The principal risk is that repeated international conferences create an appearance of political momentum while the conditions necessary to influence armed organisations remain unchanged.

Germany: Humanitarian Financing, Diplomatic Coordination and the Strategic Governance of International Assistance

Germany’s role is defined by financial capacity, multilateral diplomacy and institutional implementation

Germany approaches the Sudanese crisis from a strategic position different from that of Italy and France. Its principal assets include substantial humanitarian financing, engagement with international development institutions, diplomatic coordination and influence over European economic and regulatory policy. Its direct security interests are less closely associated with Sudanese territory than with the consequences of regional instability for international governance, humanitarian systems and European economic resilience.

Germany’s strategic challenge is to convert financial and diplomatic influence into durable institutional results under conditions in which humanitarian needs are growing faster than the international system’s capacity to respond. The problem is not simply one of financing. It concerns whether resources can reach the populations for whom they are intended, whether implementing organisations can operate safely and whether humanitarian engagement contributes to the preservation of civilian institutions rather than merely compensating for their continuing collapse.

Germany’s decision to host the April 2026 International Sudan Conference illustrates its institutional approach. The conference was explicitly organised to mobilise assistance and reinforce diplomatic efforts towards a settlement. The German Foreign Office described a crisis in which more than 13 million people had been forcibly displaced, including approximately 4 million who had fled to neighbouring countries, while almost half of the country’s population faced inadequate access to food. These were figures presented at the conference and must be interpreted according to their April 2026 reference period rather than treated as a permanent statistical baseline. International Sudan Conference in Berlin — German Federal Foreign Office — April 2026.

In a speech to the United Nations General Assembly on 1 June 2026, German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul stated that the Berlin conference had mobilised approximately US$1.7 billion in humanitarian assistance, including US$270 million from Germany. The amount differs in currency and presentation from the approximately €1.5 billion described in the April conference communiqué. The two figures should not be interpreted as separate fundraising outcomes or added together; they describe the same broader conference mobilisation using different currency denominations and reporting conventions. Statement by Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul on International Mediation — German Federal Foreign Office — June 2026.

The German contribution is significant because it demonstrates the government’s willingness to use financial commitments alongside its diplomatic convening capacity. However, the operational effectiveness of this approach depends on several intervening factors. Announced funding must become legally committed and disbursed resources; implementing organisations must obtain access; assistance must reach identified populations; and local service providers must possess the capacity to operate under continuing insecurity.

These distinctions become particularly important where donor announcements are compared internationally. A country’s contribution may include multilateral allocations, bilateral assistance, regional refugee programmes or funding across different fiscal periods. Without reconciliation of these categories, comparisons can exaggerate differences in generosity or obscure the actual geographical distribution of assistance.

The challenge of preserving humanitarian effectiveness under conditions of institutional collapse

Germany’s traditional emphasis on multilateral organisations creates opportunities for coordination and established administrative oversight, but it also exposes its programmes to the limitations of humanitarian delivery systems operating in active conflict environments.

Where agencies face restrictions on movement, damaged infrastructure or threats against personnel, additional financial resources do not automatically produce a proportional increase in assistance. Funding effectiveness depends on the operational capacity of implementing organisations, the availability of supplies and the security conditions under which assistance can be delivered.

This creates a fundamental policy problem: the international humanitarian system can mobilise considerable financial resources while remaining unable to guarantee reliable access to the populations most severely affected by violence.

Germany can influence this problem through diplomatic support for humanitarian access, coordination with implementing organisations and financing arrangements that provide greater predictability. Yet the effects will depend on the behaviour of the belligerents and the capacity of humanitarian organisations to operate under the prevailing security conditions.

Financial predictability is especially important for programmes involving health services, water infrastructure, nutrition, education and local organisational capacity. Emergency interventions may be designed around immediate needs, but preserving these services requires continuity in staffing, supplies and operational planning. Repeated funding uncertainty can force organisations to interrupt programmes, reduce personnel or abandon investments whose benefits would otherwise extend beyond a single budget cycle.

A strategically coherent German policy should therefore distinguish urgent relief from the preservation of civilian institutional capacity. Both are necessary, but they operate through different instruments and time horizons.

German industrial and financial policy has a separate security function

Germany’s industrial economy and financial institutions also have responsibilities arising from the implementation of European restrictive measures. These responsibilities are not evidence that German companies are materially involved in Sudanese military procurement. Rather, they reflect the general obligation to identify and prevent prohibited transactions involving designated persons, controlled products or activities covered by applicable European regulations.

The July 2026 European restrictions on Sudanese-origin gold and specified mining chemicals illustrate the importance of industrial and financial compliance. Enterprises involved in chemical production, logistics, financial services or international commodity trading must assess whether their transactions fall within the defined scope of the measures.

This requires attention to product classification, contractual counterparties, the origin of goods and the provision of associated services. It also requires avoiding unnecessary disruption of lawful civilian commerce.

Germany’s contribution to European security policy can therefore include the development of stronger compliance capacity and institutional cooperation, rather than relying exclusively on additional restrictive measures.

Table 7.4 — Germany: Financial Commitments and Implementation Requirements

Policy dimension	Documented figure or institutional baseline	Strategic objective	Implementation challenge
National humanitarian contribution announced at Berlin	US$270 million reported by the German Foreign Minister	Support emergency humanitarian operations	Confirm allocation, disbursement, geographical coverage and results
International mobilisation associated with Berlin	Approximately US$1.7 billion, as reported in June 2026	Sustain international donor participation	Avoid double counting with euro-denominated conference figures
Multilateral conference participation	55 participating states	Coordinate diplomacy and humanitarian financing	Translate declarations into implementation
Political coordination	Support for the Berlin Principles and civilian political engagement	Reinforce a Sudanese-led settlement process	Maintain continuity between diplomatic meetings
European economic governance	Participation in EU sanctions and common trade regulation	Constrain legally prohibited activities	Maintain consistent interpretation and effective supervision
Humanitarian delivery	Funding through international and implementing organisations	Reach vulnerable populations and sustain services	Access restrictions, insecurity and operational fragmentation
Medium-term resilience	Potential support for civilian institutions and basic services	Reduce prolonged dependence on emergency assistance	Avoid rebuilding structures without accountable political authority

Sources: German Federal Foreign Office — International Sudan Conference — April 2026; German Foreign Minister’s Statement at the United Nations — June 2026.

Germany’s strategic advantage lies in combining sustained humanitarian financing with diplomatic coordination and institutional implementation capacity. Its principal vulnerability is that financial commitments, however substantial, cannot substitute for political access, civilian protection and functioning local institutions. A policy evaluated primarily through announced funding would therefore provide an incomplete measurement of its actual strategic effect.

United Kingdom: Security Council Leadership, Financial Enforcement and the Limits of Diplomatic Capacity

The United Kingdom possesses substantial formal influence but faces documented implementation constraints

The United Kingdom occupies a distinctive position in Sudan-related diplomacy because of its permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council, its role in drafting and coordinating Council initiatives concerning Sudan, its national sanctions framework and its established development and humanitarian relationships.

The principal British strategic problem is the difference between diplomatic authority and the administrative resources required to exercise that authority consistently. The United Kingdom possesses mechanisms capable of shaping international discussions, but maintaining an effective policy also requires regional analysis, personnel, sustained financing, coordination among government departments and reliable relationships with Sudanese and international partners.

This distinction was examined in unusual detail by the Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI), which published its review of UK assistance to Sudan on 15 October 2025. The review found that Britain had demonstrated credible political leadership and technical expertise, but also identified significant shortcomings in cross-government coordination, staffing, funding predictability and regional strategy.

ICAI reported that the United Kingdom had increased its assistance to Sudan and neighbouring countries to £231.3 million during financial year 2024–2025. It also found that the British Office Sudan, operating from Addis Ababa and Nairobi following the evacuation of personnel from Khartoum, remained under-resourced for the scale and complexity of the crisis. The review highlighted limited engagement by the Ministry of Defence and Home Office despite the conflict’s military and migration-related dimensions. UK Aid to Sudan — Independent Commission for Aid Impact — October 2025.

This is a particularly important finding because it identifies a limitation that cannot be resolved solely through additional humanitarian pledges. A government may possess diplomatic influence at the Security Council and maintain technically capable humanitarian personnel while still lacking the integrated administrative framework required to connect diplomacy, security, migration analysis and development policy.

The same review identified seven recommendations intended to improve British engagement. They included sustained senior political attention, a clearer regional strategy, greater predictability of funding, stronger support for local organisations and improvements in the responsiveness of humanitarian assistance. The British government accepted all seven recommendations in December 2025, according to the July 2026 follow-up documentation. Initial Government Update on the UK Aid to Sudan Review — Independent Commission for Aid Impact — July 2026.

The strategic significance is that the UK’s weaknesses are not merely speculative. They have been documented through an official independent evaluation, creating an institutional baseline against which future policy changes can be assessed.

Humanitarian commitments must be distinguished from actual programme outcomes

On 15 April 2026, the British government announced £146 million in humanitarian funding for Sudan and a doubling of funding for local frontline responders and Sudanese aid organisations to up to £15 million.

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office described the commitment as part of its engagement at the Berlin conference and emphasised support for populations living in areas difficult for conventional international assistance to reach. UK Boosts Funding to Local Responders to Help More Than 1.8 Million People in Sudan’s Humanitarian Crisis — Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office — April 2026.

The £146 million pledge and the £231.3 million reported for 2024–2025 must not be presented as directly comparable annual national aid totals. The former concerns a stated Sudan funding commitment for 2026, while the latter refers to support across Sudan and affected neighbouring countries during a specified British financial year.

The emphasis on local responders is strategically important. Sudanese organisations possess local knowledge and community relationships that may enable them to operate where international institutions face access restrictions or limited presence. Nevertheless, local organisations also face severe security threats, financial constraints and administrative burdens.

A more effective British approach would provide sufficiently predictable support while maintaining appropriate safeguards against diversion and protecting the neutrality of humanitarian operations. The challenge is not simply to increase the proportion of assistance channelled through local actors, but to construct arrangements that permit them to sustain operations without transferring unreasonable financial or security risks onto organisations with limited resources.

The UK’s Security Council and sanctions roles create both leverage and responsibility

The United Kingdom’s role as a Security Council penholder on Sudan provides an opportunity to develop resolutions, coordinate negotiations and maintain political attention. However, the effectiveness of this role depends on agreement among Council members and the willingness of the belligerents to comply with resulting obligations. Penholder status does not provide independent enforcement authority over Sudanese territory.

The British sanctions framework offers a separate instrument. The Sudan (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020 establish the relevant domestic regime, including provisions concerning financial, trade, immigration and other restrictive measures. The United Kingdom has subsequently used this framework to designate individuals and entities associated with Sudan’s conflict. Sudan Sanctions: Statutory Guidance — United Kingdom Government — Updated May 2026.

On 16 July 2026, the United Kingdom recorded 11 new designations under its Sudan sanctions regime. Earlier actions during 2026 included additional designations and modifications of existing entries. These measures demonstrate continuing enforcement activity but do not establish the financial amount frozen, the value of prevented transactions or the degree to which the military capabilities of the targeted actors were reduced. Sudan: List of Designations and Sanctions Notices — United Kingdom Government — July 2026.

The British financial system’s international connections create opportunities to identify prohibited transactions involving designated persons, but they also make compliance technically demanding. Ownership structures may involve several jurisdictions, while particular transactions may require examination of beneficial ownership, end use and the services provided by intermediaries.

The United Kingdom must therefore coordinate sanctions enforcement with diplomatic engagement and humanitarian licensing arrangements. A policy that introduces additional financial restrictions without adequate administrative capacity may increase compliance costs without proportionately reducing prohibited military support.

Table 7.5 — United Kingdom: Audited Performance, Funding and Enforcement

Indicator	Documented value or finding	Period	Strategic interpretation
UK assistance to Sudan and affected neighbouring countries	£231.3 million	Financial year 2024–2025	Demonstrates substantial humanitarian financing across a regional programme
Humanitarian funding announced for Sudan	£146 million	April 2026 announcement	Establishes a further national humanitarian commitment
Local frontline responder funding	Up to £15 million	April 2026 announcement	Indicates increased emphasis on Sudanese organisations
Independent review recommendations	7 recommendations	October 2025	Documents areas requiring improvement in UK policy implementation
Government response	All 7 recommendations accepted	December 2025	Establishes formal commitment to reform
Sanctions designations	11 new entries	16 July 2026	Demonstrates continued use of national restrictive measures
Diplomatic responsibility	Permanent Security Council member and Sudan penholder	Continuing institutional role	Provides convening and drafting influence, subject to Council agreement
Identified administrative weakness	Inadequate staffing, inconsistent political engagement and absence of a sufficiently integrated regional approach	ICAI evaluation covering 2019–mid-2025	Demonstrates the importance of implementation capacity

Sources: ICAI, UK Aid to Sudan — October 2025; UK Humanitarian Funding Announcement — April 2026; ICAI Government Follow-Up — July 2026; UK Sudan Sanctions Notices — July 2026.

The British case demonstrates that a coherent Sudan strategy requires more than strong diplomatic statements and increased expenditure. Its effectiveness depends on the integration of Security Council diplomacy, regional policy, financial enforcement, humanitarian delivery and sustained institutional capacity.

The European Union: From Humanitarian Donor to Economic-Security Regulator

The EU possesses the widest range of collective instruments but not a unified national-security authority

The European Union’s strategic relevance to Sudan arises from its ability to combine humanitarian financing, diplomatic coordination, trade regulation and restrictive measures within a common institutional framework. These capabilities give the Union considerable influence over economic activities occurring within its jurisdiction and enable it to participate in international efforts to constrain resources associated with the conflict.

However, the European Union is not a unitary geopolitical actor with unrestricted authority over member-state military operations, intelligence services or national foreign-policy relationships. Its effectiveness depends on the legal competences assigned to EU institutions, agreement among member states where required and the quality of implementation at national level.

This distinction is particularly important in relation to Sudan because the Union’s strongest available instruments are not necessarily military. They include the regulation of particular financial and commercial transactions, international development assistance, humanitarian funding and coordinated diplomatic engagement.

Humanitarian financing provides substantial leverage but cannot guarantee political outcomes

At the Berlin conference in April 2026, the European Commission announced that the European Union and its member states had pledged more than €812 million towards responding to Sudan’s humanitarian emergency.

The Commission identified its own contribution as €360.8 million, divided between €215.5 million for people affected within Sudan and €145.3 million for the regional refugee response.

The remaining portion of the collective European pledge reflects member-state commitments within the wider announcement. The Commission’s contribution must not be added again to the EU-and-member-state aggregate, because it is already included. EU and Member States Pledge Over €812 Million in Response to Crisis in Sudan — European Commission, DG ECHO — April 2026.

The scale of these commitments establishes the Union as an important humanitarian actor. Their strategic value, however, should be measured through implementation rather than announced amounts alone. The relevant questions concern the allocation of funding, the capacity to deliver assistance, the protection of humanitarian personnel and the sustainability of programmes intended to preserve essential civilian services.

For the European Union, humanitarian assistance has an additional geopolitical function. It can support neighbouring countries hosting displaced populations, reduce pressure on local public services and reinforce cooperation with African institutions. But these effects are conditional. Assistance may alleviate immediate needs without changing the military incentives that caused displacement.

The EU therefore needs a clear distinction between financing designed to save lives and political instruments intended to influence the behaviour of armed organisations.

The July 2026 gold measures mark a significant regulatory development

On 13 July 2026, the Council adopted additional restrictive measures targeting the economic structures associated with Sudan’s conflict.

The measures introduced a prohibition on purchasing, importing or transferring Sudanese-origin gold, together with restrictions on supplying mercury and cyanide used in gold extraction. Associated prohibitions concern services including technical assistance, brokering and financial assistance.

The Council linked these measures to its objective of reducing the financial resources sustaining the war. Sudan: Council Strengthens EU Sanctions Regime by Targeting Gold Trade — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The legal importance of these measures lies in the transition from restrictions directed primarily at identified persons and entities towards prohibitions affecting defined categories of economic activity.

The distinction is consequential because a commercial transaction may become prohibited because of the origin of the product or the nature of the service, even where the immediate commercial counterparty is not individually designated.

The Council’s subsequent statement on 29 July 2026 clarified that the gold restriction applies to gold originating in Sudan and exported from Sudan into the Union or a third country after 15 July 2026, subject to the applicable legal provisions. The statement also recorded the alignment of several non-EU European and neighbouring partner countries with the relevant Council decision. Statement on Alignment with Sudan Restrictive Measures — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

The significance extends beyond commodity trade. The measure creates practical obligations involving product origin, import documentation, financial services and commercial due diligence. Its effectiveness depends on whether competent authorities can identify restricted transactions and whether economic participants comply with the applicable requirements.

A ban on Sudanese-origin gold entering the European market does not automatically eliminate demand elsewhere. The policy may therefore influence trading routes and the incentives of intermediaries, while the actual reduction in conflict-related revenue requires evidence of enforcement and trade-flow changes.

The EU’s principal challenge is to ensure that financial and commercial restrictions affect the resources sustaining armed conflict without unnecessarily damaging legitimate civilian livelihoods or future reconstruction opportunities.

European maritime security must remain legally and operationally distinct from Sudan intervention

The Union’s maritime presence creates a potential capacity to address wider regional security consequences, but existing operational mandates must be respected.

EUNAVFOR ASPIDES is a defensive operation intended to protect commercial shipping and preserve freedom of navigation in its designated area. It is not a general authorisation for the use of European naval forces in Sudanese internal military operations.

The distinction matters both legally and strategically. Maritime protection, monitoring of navigational threats and the enforcement of particular maritime measures require different legal foundations and operational arrangements.

An expansion of maritime tasks would need to be assessed according to the relevant mandate, applicable international law, political authorisation and the operational resources required. It cannot be inferred automatically from concerns over the Sudanese conflict.

Table 7.6 — European Union Instruments: Competence, Effects and Limitations

EU instrument	Competent institutional framework	Documented basis	Expected contribution	Principal limitation
Humanitarian assistance	European Commission and implementing partners	€360.8 million Commission contribution announced in April 2026	Relief inside Sudan and in affected neighbouring countries	Delivery constrained by access, security and implementing capacity
Collective member-state coordination	EU institutions and member governments	More than €812 million collective pledge in April 2026	Financial burden-sharing and common humanitarian priorities	Commitments require disbursement and operational follow-through
Restrictive measures	Council decisions and EU regulations	July 2026 gold and mining-chemical measures	Constrain designated economic transactions	Enforcement and substitution may limit practical impact
National enforcement	Member-state competent authorities	Applicable EU restrictive-measures framework	Licensing, investigation and compliance	Implementation depends on national resources and legal processes
Common diplomacy	High Representative, EEAS and member states	Berlin and September 2026 coordination processes	Support political dialogue and international alignment	Requires agreement among partners and Sudanese participants
Maritime protection	EUNAVFOR ASPIDES within its mandate	Defensive mission established February 2024	Protect designated commercial navigation	Does not authorise general intervention in Sudan
African institutional cooperation	EU–African Union diplomatic arrangements	Participation of AU in joint international processes	Support African-led political engagement	Effectiveness depends on political legitimacy and local consent
Reconstruction-related assistance	EU development and external-action instruments where authorised	Existing external-assistance competences	Support eventual restoration of civilian services	Requires appropriate security conditions and credible governance

Sources: European Commission Humanitarian Pledge — April 2026; Council of the EU, Sudan Restrictive Measures — July 2026; EUNAVFOR ASPIDES Mandate — European External Action Service — 2026.

NATO: Collective Defence, Southern Security Cooperation and the Limits of Alliance Responsibility

Sudan is relevant to NATO’s security environment without automatically becoming a NATO operational theatre

Sudan’s war has implications for the security interests of individual NATO allies, but it does not create an automatic collective-defence obligation or establish a NATO mandate to conduct military operations in Sudan. This distinction is essential because the Alliance’s responsibilities derive from the North Atlantic Treaty, decisions taken by its members and the mandates governing particular activities.

The absence of a direct NATO operational role does not mean that Sudan is strategically irrelevant to the Alliance. Instability across northeastern Africa can affect the security environment of allied countries through regional conflict dynamics, the proliferation of military technology, maritime insecurity and pressure on neighbouring states.

NATO’s engagement with African security institutions provides an existing framework for understanding the appropriate limits of potential cooperation.

The Alliance’s relationship with the African Union began in 2005, when NATO provided logistical and airlift support associated with the African Union mission in Sudan. The relationship subsequently evolved towards cooperation involving operational support, training and institutional assistance in response to African Union requests.

NATO’s official framework emphasises African ownership and coordination with relevant international organisations. Cooperation with the African Union — North Atlantic Treaty Organization — Updated April 2023.

This institutional history matters because it establishes a precedent for supporting African-led operations without presuming that NATO itself should direct the political or military management of Sudan’s conflict.

The technological significance of Sudan does not imply an Alliance-wide military threat

The proliferation of remotely operated military systems, electronic warfare techniques and externally supported military services creates issues relevant to NATO’s broader defence planning. However, their relevance should be analysed according to actual capability, transfer pathways and possible threats to allied security rather than through general comparisons between conflicts.

A military technique observed in Sudan may become relevant to NATO if it demonstrates a transferable capability, exposes a particular operational vulnerability or provides evidence that relevant technology is being acquired by actors capable of threatening Alliance interests.

The appropriate response is therefore a process of analytical assessment and lessons identification, not the assumption that every technological development inside Sudan requires NATO countermeasures.

This distinction also applies to maritime security. Individual NATO members may participate in national or European maritime activities, but participation by allied states does not automatically transform an EU mission into a NATO operation.

NATO’s most defensible role is cooperation within existing legal and political frameworks

Potential areas of relevance include dialogue with the African Union, exchange of appropriate lessons concerning military technology, maritime-security coordination and support for partner capacity where formally requested and authorised.

Any expansion would require consideration of political consent, legal authority, resources, operational risk and the relationship with existing European and African mechanisms.

A NATO military intervention aimed at resolving Sudan’s civil war would be a fundamentally different proposition and cannot be justified merely by the existence of instability or the presence of internationally supplied weapons.

Table 7.7 — NATO and Sudan: Established Authority Versus Potential Security Relevance

Dimension	Established institutional position	Potential relevance	Constraint
Collective defence	NATO’s treaty-based collective-defence framework	Protection of allies against qualifying threats	Sudan’s civil war does not automatically trigger Article 5
African Union cooperation	NATO–AU relationship established in 2005	Training, logistical support and institutional cooperation when requested	African ownership and agreed mandates
Historical Sudan engagement	NATO airlift and logistical support for AU activities in Sudan	Institutional precedent for limited support	Does not authorise a present intervention
Military technology assessment	NATO’s wider defence and security expertise	Assessment of relevant technological developments	Requires evidence of transferable capability and Alliance relevance
Maritime security coordination	Allied states participate in various national and multilateral arrangements	Coordination where security interests overlap	EU operations are not automatically NATO missions
Regional stability	Alliance interest in security challenges affecting its members	Consultation and partner cooperation	Political consensus, resources and appropriate authority

Official basis: NATO Cooperation with the African Union; NATO Operations and Missions.

NATO’s strategic interest should be understood primarily through the security consequences of Sudan’s instability rather than through an assumption that the Alliance must become a belligerent or operational manager of the conflict. Its most credible contribution lies in appropriately authorised cooperation, the protection of allied interests and coordination that complements rather than displaces African and European institutions.

Comparative European Strategic Assessment: Different National Interests, Shared Dependencies and Unequal Implementation Capacity

The preceding country assessments demonstrate that Europe’s interests in Sudan are not uniform. Italy’s exposure is particularly connected to Mediterranean and Red Sea connectivity and operational humanitarian cooperation. France possesses significant diplomatic and African regional interests. Germany combines humanitarian financing with multilateral coordination and economic governance. The United Kingdom contributes Security Council leadership and a separate financial-sanctions system. The European Union provides collective regulatory and humanitarian instruments, while NATO operates within a substantially different collective-security framework.

These differences are not necessarily weaknesses. They can create complementary capabilities when the respective institutions coordinate their activities around shared, measurable objectives. The difficulty arises when different governments define success through incompatible indicators or pursue actions whose effects are not evaluated across the wider regional system.

The principal European coordination problem is therefore the relationship between political objectives, institutional authority and measurable implementation. An increase in humanitarian financing may reduce immediate suffering without changing the military balance. Additional sanctions may affect identified commercial activities without producing a ceasefire. Maritime-security operations may protect vessels while leaving the causes of instability onshore unresolved.

Each policy instrument must consequently be judged against the outcome it is designed to influence.

Table 7.8 — Comparative Strategic Responsibilities of Italy, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the EU and NATO

Actor	Primary strategic interest	Demonstrated instrument	Main implementation vulnerability	Most defensible policy emphasis
Italy	Mediterranean stability, Red Sea connectivity and humanitarian engagement	Italy for Sudan operational assistance	Fragmentation between humanitarian, commercial and security policy	Integrated regional risk monitoring and sustained civilian assistance
France	African security relationships, diplomacy and international accountability	Paris conference, Berlin co-hosting and Security Council participation	Gap between diplomatic mobilisation and enforcement outcomes	African-led diplomacy supported by accountability and access measures
Germany	Humanitarian financing, multilateral coordination and institutional resilience	Berlin conference and substantial funding commitment	Financial mobilisation does not guarantee humanitarian access	Predictable financing and stronger evaluation of delivery outcomes
United Kingdom	Security Council diplomacy, sanctions and regional humanitarian policy	National sanctions, aid commitments and international convening	Documented staffing and coordination weaknesses	Integrated regional strategy and enforcement implementation
European Union	Collective humanitarian response, trade governance and sanctions	EU funding, gold restrictions and diplomatic coordination	Divergent national enforcement capabilities	Consistent regulation and coordinated implementation
NATO	Alliance security and cooperation with African institutions	NATO–AU cooperation framework	Limited direct legal and operational relevance to Sudan	Partner cooperation and narrowly defined security assessment

The comparative baseline draws on the Italian Foreign Ministry’s May 2026 Report, French Ministry’s September 2026 Ministerial Statement, German Foreign Office’s Berlin Conference Record, ICAI’s Review of UK Aid to Sudan, EU Council Restrictive Measures and NATO’s African Union Cooperation Framework.

Strategic Policy Integration: From Parallel National Initiatives to Coordinated European Action

An effective European response requires a division of responsibilities that reflects actual competences while establishing mechanisms for coordination. The objective should not be to create another nominal diplomatic framework without a defined implementation function. It should be to reduce the distance between European commitments and observable changes affecting civilians, regional partners and the financing of armed conflict.

Four policy functions warrant particular attention.

The first is the integration of humanitarian financing with access and protection indicators. European institutions should measure not only the resources committed but also the reliability of delivery, the geographical areas reached and the operational continuity of essential services. International donors should distinguish programme expenditure from verified outcomes and avoid treating aggregate pledges as evidence that humanitarian requirements have been satisfied.

The second is the coordination of lawful financial and commercial enforcement. The July 2026 EU measures and Britain’s separate sanctions framework create opportunities for cooperation concerning restricted trade, beneficial ownership and the identification of prohibited transactions. This cooperation should operate through competent national and European authorities, with appropriate legal safeguards and clear humanitarian arrangements.

The third is the strengthening of regional diplomatic engagement. European governments should support the African Union and relevant international organisations while ensuring that Sudanese civilian actors are not displaced by negotiations restricted to foreign governments and military leaders. The Berlin and September 2026 diplomatic processes provide institutional foundations, but their value depends on continuity and implementation.

The fourth is the incorporation of Sudan into wider European resilience planning without inaccurately treating it as the cause of every regional threat. Maritime security, migration-related pressures and defence technology proliferation should be evaluated through distinct evidence-based frameworks. This would permit governments to identify developments genuinely connected to Sudan while avoiding policy responses driven by unsupported causal assumptions.

Table 7.9 — European Policy Options: Authority, Implementation Burden and Strategic Risk

Course of action	Responsible authority	Expected effect	Time-to-effect	Implementation burden	Reversibility and principal risk
Increase predictable humanitarian financing	European Commission and national donor governments	Improve continuity of assistance and service delivery	Immediate commitments; operational effects over months	Funding, coordination, monitoring and access negotiation	Funding allocations can be adjusted; risk of dependence without institutional recovery
Improve sanctions enforcement coordination	EU and UK competent authorities	Reduce opportunities for prohibited transactions	Months, depending on investigations	Financial intelligence, legal review and cross-border cooperation	Individual measures can be reviewed; risk of excessive compliance burdens
Support African-led political dialogue	African Union and participating European diplomatic institutions	Strengthen legitimacy and coordination of mediation	Months to years	Political engagement and sustained institutional support	Diplomatic commitments can evolve; risk of exclusion or fragmentation
Strengthen humanitarian access monitoring	UN and humanitarian actors supported by donor governments	Improve identification of access restrictions and operational gaps	Months	Monitoring capacity and security arrangements	Adaptable; risk to personnel where protective conditions are inadequate
Develop maritime contingency planning	National maritime authorities and competent EU mechanisms	Improve commercial resilience to verified disruption	Months	Industry coordination and scenario planning	Highly reversible; risk of allocating resources to unsubstantiated threats
Improve defence-related export compliance	National licensing authorities and EU frameworks	Reduce unlawful or unauthorised transfers	Months to years	Documentation, technical assessment and enforcement	Licensing decisions are reviewable; risk of inappropriate restrictions on lawful trade
Support host-country institutional capacity	European donors and African partner governments	Reduce pressures on services in displacement-affected regions	Years	Financing, governance and implementation capacity	Long-term commitments are difficult to reverse without harming beneficiaries
Maintain NATO–AU cooperation where requested	NATO and African Union	Support agreed institutional or security functions	Depends on mandate and request	Political agreement and specialised resources	Mandate-dependent; risk of mission expansion beyond agreed objectives

These options should not be treated as interchangeable substitutes. Financial enforcement cannot replace civilian protection, humanitarian assistance cannot establish political legitimacy, and maritime defence cannot resolve Sudan’s internal institutional conflict. Their strategic value depends on their coordination and on the definition of measurable outcomes appropriate to each instrument.

The European Decision Problem: Strategic Ambition Without a Unified Theory of Implementation

The European response to Sudan has demonstrated substantial humanitarian mobilisation, sustained diplomatic attention and a willingness to introduce economic restrictions intended to affect the financial structures sustaining the conflict. These developments are significant, but they do not establish that Europe has acquired decisive influence over the belligerents.

The gap between institutional activity and conflict outcomes remains the principal analytical concern.

Diplomatic conferences can assemble governments and secure public commitments, but they cannot independently guarantee compliance with ceasefire arrangements. Financial restrictions can prohibit transactions under European jurisdiction, but they cannot automatically prevent trade through unrelated markets. Humanitarian funding can save lives and preserve essential services, but it cannot fully compensate for continuing military attacks, inaccessible territory or the collapse of civilian administration.

A coherent strategy must therefore identify the conditions under which each instrument can be expected to influence the broader conflict. It should distinguish actions that reduce immediate civilian suffering from those intended to change the resources or political incentives of armed organisations.

The European Union and its member states would also benefit from a clearer division between national interests and collective objectives. Maritime-security concerns may be especially salient to some governments, while humanitarian financing or African diplomacy may be prioritised by others. These differences can be accommodated if common policy is defined around compatible outcomes rather than identical national motivations.

The central question for European decision-makers is not whether additional activity is necessary, but whether the instruments already available can be implemented in a manner that measurably changes the consequences and incentives of Sudan’s war.

Key Judgments

Europe’s strategic exposure to Sudan is multidimensional but unevenly distributed. Italy, France, Germany and the United Kingdom possess different combinations of commercial, diplomatic, humanitarian and security interests. Their respective policy instruments are complementary but cannot be treated as functionally equivalent.

The European Union has demonstrated substantial collective humanitarian mobilisation. The April 2026 Berlin conference established a major financial commitment, including more than €812 million from the Union and member states. The effectiveness of that commitment must be assessed through delivery and outcomes rather than announced amounts alone.

Italy possesses a distinct operational and geographical interest in Sudan. Its humanitarian engagement provides a documented foundation for cooperation, while its wider strategic exposure is associated with Mediterranean stability, Red Sea connectivity and the resilience of African partner states.

France’s comparative advantage lies in high-level diplomatic mobilisation and African regional engagement. The Paris, Berlin and September 2026 processes establish continuity, but the decisive test remains their ability to influence humanitarian access, civilian protection and political negotiations.

Germany combines significant financial commitments with multilateral institutional influence. Its challenge is to ensure that financing produces durable operational results under conditions of severe access restrictions and institutional fragmentation.

The United Kingdom retains important diplomatic and sanctions responsibilities but faces documented capacity constraints. The independent evaluation of British aid identified weaknesses in staffing, funding predictability and cross-government coordination that are directly relevant to strategic effectiveness.

The EU’s July 2026 economic measures represent an important expansion of its Sudan policy towards restrictions affecting specific components of the war economy. Their consequences depend on enforcement, international cooperation and the preservation of lawful humanitarian and civilian activity.

NATO’s relevance does not establish a mandate for intervention. The Alliance’s most defensible contribution is through existing security cooperation, analysis and appropriately authorised engagement with African institutions.

What Would Change the Assessment

The judgment that Europe possesses substantial but limited influence would strengthen if future official evaluations demonstrated that increased humanitarian financing, diplomatic coordination and economic enforcement had failed to improve access, constrain documented prohibited transactions or support meaningful de-escalation.

Conversely, the assessment would improve if European governments and international institutions documented sustained humanitarian access, independently verified reductions in conflict-related commercial support, functioning political negotiations and effective cooperation with African regional partners.

Several records would be particularly consequential: audited disbursement and outcome data from the Berlin commitments; official evaluations of the July 2026 EU economic measures; subsequent British implementation findings addressing ICAI’s recommendations; verified records of maritime incidents attributable to developments in Sudan; and evidence that political agreements had become operational rather than remaining declarations of intent.

The availability of such evidence would enable European policy to be assessed through measurable effectiveness rather than diplomatic visibility.

Final Assessment of Chapter 7

Sudan’s war has exposed an important contradiction in European external security policy. European governments possess considerable economic, diplomatic and humanitarian resources, yet their ability to influence a fragmented armed conflict depends on political decisions and military-support relationships extending beyond European jurisdiction.

The resulting challenge is not simply one of allocating additional resources. It requires identifying the institutional arrangements through which European capabilities can reinforce African-led diplomacy, constrain prohibited economic activity, preserve humanitarian access and protect legitimate European interests without creating unsupported assumptions about the nature of the threat.

The most consequential European policy failure would be the continued separation of humanitarian response, financial enforcement, maritime-security planning and regional diplomacy into parallel systems whose effects are never evaluated collectively. Such fragmentation would allow substantial expenditure and repeated diplomatic initiatives to coexist with limited understanding of whether they were altering the conflict’s underlying conditions.

A more coherent approach would preserve the distinctive responsibilities of Italy, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union and NATO while linking them through common evidence standards, clearly defined implementation objectives and regular evaluation of observable consequences.

Sudan should therefore be treated as a significant European external-security concern whose management requires institutional coordination rather than military overextension. The relevant objective is not to transform Europe into the principal arbiter of Sudan’s political future, but to use European capabilities in ways that support legitimate regional leadership, reduce the external resources sustaining violence and protect the conditions necessary for civilian recovery.

The governing conclusion is that European strategic effectiveness in Sudan will be measured not by the number of diplomatic commitments or restrictive measures adopted, but by whether those instruments produce demonstrable improvements in civilian protection, conflict financing, regional resilience and the viability of a Sudanese-led political settlement.

OPEN-SOURCE ANALYTICAL ASSESSMENT | 15 OCTOBER 2026

PILLAR III — EUROPEAN SECURITY AND THE FUTURE STRATEGIC ORDER

Chapter 8. The 2026–2031 Outlook: Escalation Pathways, Policy Options and Final Strategic Assessment

Sudan at a Strategic Inflection Point: The Conditions That Will Determine the Next Five Years

The principal strategic question confronting Sudan between October 2026 and December 2031 is whether the country’s competing military and political structures will become permanently institutionalised or whether sufficient internal and international pressure can produce an enforceable transition towards unified civilian authority. The distinction is decisive because neither the cessation of individual military campaigns nor the recovery of selected population centres would, by itself, resolve the conflict’s underlying organisation of power. Sudan’s future will depend on the simultaneous evolution of military capabilities, command relationships, external resource flows, civilian political legitimacy, economic reconstruction and the capacity of neighbouring states and international institutions to contain the consequences of continued instability.

The available evidence supports a serious risk of prolonged fragmentation, but not a deterministic prediction of partition. The armed organisations involved in the conflict face changing military, political and economic constraints. Their relationships with foreign suppliers and domestic allies may evolve; control over important territories may shift; and diplomatic initiatives may alter incentives for continued confrontation. Equally, a negotiated reduction in hostilities may not immediately eliminate armed autonomy, competing administrative arrangements or the financial relationships established during the war. A reduction in battlefield violence and the reconstruction of a functioning national state are separate outcomes that must be evaluated through different indicators and over different periods.

The five-year strategic horizon is particularly important because the consequences of prolonged conflict are cumulative. Each additional year of insecurity can weaken education, reduce access to healthcare, interrupt agricultural production, displace qualified personnel and increase the cost of restoring public institutions. These effects may continue to worsen even where the overall intensity of military operations fluctuates. A political settlement reached after substantial institutional deterioration may therefore face more demanding reconstruction conditions than one achieved earlier, even if the formal provisions of the two agreements are similar.

The urgency of this challenge is demonstrated by the latest official humanitarian assessment available at the report’s cut-off. On 12 October 2026, the World Health Organization communicated an Integrated Food Security Phase Classification alert warning of a growing famine risk across parts of Greater Darfur and Greater Kordofan. The alert identified the combined effects of conflict, population displacement, severe drought and inadequate humanitarian funding, noting that drought associated with El Niño was affecting approximately half of Sudan. It also identified the deterioration of water and healthcare access as a factor increasing vulnerability to disease and mortality. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — World Health Organization — October 2026.

The strategic implications extend considerably beyond food availability. When a state cannot reliably maintain the infrastructure necessary for survival, the resulting insecurity can weaken political legitimacy, accelerate population movement, increase reliance on local armed authorities and reduce the economic resources available for recovery. The relationship can become self-reinforcing: military activity damages essential systems; their deterioration reduces productive capacity; reduced productive capacity increases dependence on emergency resources; and the weakening of civilian institutions makes it more difficult to reconstruct a legitimate political order.

The October alert also establishes an important limitation on purely military forecasts. An assessment focused exclusively on territorial gains, procurement patterns or the capabilities of armed formations would fail to capture processes capable of determining whether communities remain viable after the fighting moves elsewhere. The decisive five-year outcome will therefore be measured through the recovery or continued destruction of civilian governance and essential services, not simply through the military position of the principal belligerents at the end of the forecasting period.

The baseline contains both instruments that could support stabilisation and evidence of the obstacles confronting them. On 26 June 2026, the United States Treasury called for an immediate, unconditional three-month humanitarian truce and urged external actors to cease military and financial support to the belligerents. The same announcement imposed sanctions on eight individuals and entities connected to procurement and foreign recruitment networks sustaining the war. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

Meanwhile, the international Sudan conference held in Berlin on 15 April 2026 established a diplomatic framework bringing together 55 states and major international and African institutions. The participants supported an inclusive Sudanese political dialogue, immediate humanitarian access and an end to external assistance prolonging the war. The co-hosts also recognised an essential sequencing principle: humanitarian access must not be conditional on obtaining a ceasefire, even though a credible ceasefire would substantially improve the conditions under which sustained relief and reconstruction could proceed. Co-Host Communiqué — International Sudan Conference Berlin — German Federal Foreign Office — April 2026.

These developments provide a foundation for a future settlement, but they do not establish that the necessary political agreement, command compliance or security guarantees have already been achieved. The difference between international commitments and enforceable arrangements remains the central uncertainty for the coming five years.

The Five Strategic Variables That Will Determine Sudan’s 2031 Political and Security Order

A credible forecast requires identifying the variables capable of altering the conflict’s trajectory, rather than extrapolating from the latest territorial map. The decisive variables are related, but they are not interchangeable, and a change in one may produce very different consequences depending on the behaviour of the others.

The first variable is the internal cohesion of the principal military organisations and their allied formations. The capacity of a commander to announce a cessation of hostilities is not identical to the ability to ensure compliance by every associated armed unit. Military coalitions may preserve common objectives during offensive operations while disagreeing over territorial administration, integration arrangements, resource distribution or accountability. Consequently, the credibility of any political settlement will depend on the degree to which armed leaders can enforce decisions throughout their organisations and the extent to which allied formations accept the obligations negotiated on their behalf.

The second variable is the sustainability of external procurement, financing and military services. The official United States sanctions record demonstrates that Sudanese belligerents have accessed internationally distributed commercial structures and specialised personnel networks. The continued availability of these functions can alter the economic consequences of battlefield losses. A military organisation capable of replacing critical resources may remain operational despite serious setbacks, while an organisation whose supply relationships become unreliable may experience growing constraints. The relevant question is not the number of sanctions announcements or alleged foreign suppliers, but whether verified changes occur in the availability of essential capabilities and support functions.

The third variable is the political status of competing territorial administrations. Military fragmentation becomes more difficult to reverse when separate authorities develop durable administrative structures, financial relationships and constituencies dependent upon their continued existence. The strategic risk is not limited to formal secession. A country may preserve internationally recognised borders while operating through mutually incompatible systems of taxation, policing, justice, education and public administration. Such an outcome would complicate reconstruction and create persistent uncertainty over the authority responsible for national obligations.

The fourth variable is the capacity to preserve civilian life and restore economically productive activity. Agricultural production, water systems, electricity, healthcare, transport and education constitute an interconnected foundation for recovery. Their deterioration can reduce the capacity of communities to support themselves and undermine the material conditions necessary for political stabilisation. The October 2026 WHO assessment demonstrates the scale of the problem: only 23% of the organisation’s US$97.7 million humanitarian appeal had been funded, while 37% of healthcare facilities were nonfunctional and 228 attacks on healthcare had been verified since April 2023, associated with 2,055 deaths and 817 injuries. These indicators reveal structural vulnerability that cannot be addressed through military negotiations alone. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — WHO — October 2026.

The fifth variable is the degree of coordination among regional and international actors. External governments and international institutions possess different instruments and sometimes competing interests. Humanitarian organisations can provide relief but cannot impose a national political settlement. Financial authorities can restrict designated transactions but cannot independently establish command compliance. Diplomatic initiatives can create negotiating opportunities but depend on the behaviour of the parties concerned. Regional governments can influence border security and refugee protection without necessarily controlling the political decisions of Sudanese armed organisations.

The five variables interact. Restrictions on military supply could increase incentives for negotiation, but those incentives may be insufficient if political leaders believe their survival depends on retaining independent armed authority. A ceasefire could improve humanitarian access, but sustained recovery may remain impossible without administrative agreements covering essential services. International financing could support reconstruction, but investments may become unsustainable if renewed attacks repeatedly destroy restored infrastructure.

The central five-year policy requirement is therefore to create mutually reinforcing changes across military incentives, political authority, economic sustainability and civilian security. Progress isolated within only one of these domains may reduce immediate harm without transforming the underlying conflict.

Table 8.1 — Decisive Variables for the 2026–2031 Strategic Forecast

Strategic variable	October 2026 assessment	Evidence required to demonstrate improvement	Evidence indicating deterioration	Consequence for the five-year outlook
Military command cohesion	Competing military structures and allied formations remain central to the conflict	Verifiable command compliance, enforceable agreements and functioning joint monitoring	Armed splintering, repeated noncompliance and uncontrolled allied operations	Determines whether cessation of hostilities can become enforceable
External military support	Official sanctions findings establish international procurement and recruitment networks	Verified interruption of prohibited support functions and improved end-user controls	New documented networks, successor entities and additional unlawful transfers	Influences the military resources available for continued operations
Territorial administration	Competing centres of authority undermine national institutional coherence	Agreements restoring accountable civilian administration and compatible national procedures	Consolidation of incompatible administrative, financial and security structures	Determines the risk of de facto partition
Civilian infrastructure	Essential service continuity remains severely impaired	Sustained operation of water, energy, transport and healthcare facilities	Repeated damage, extended closures and failed restoration	Determines the viability of population return and productive recovery
Food and health security	Famine risk and healthcare disruption remain severe	Verified improvement in food access, nutrition treatment and health-service availability	Expanding severe malnutrition, disease and inaccessible healthcare	Determines the scale of preventable mortality and humanitarian dependence
Regional stability	Large-scale displacement places continuing pressure on neighbouring states	Reduced new arrivals, stronger host-country capacity and fewer verified border incidents	Recurrent border insecurity, additional displacement and service collapse	Determines whether instability remains principally Sudanese or becomes more regionalised
International coordination	Multiple diplomatic, sanctions and humanitarian mechanisms coexist	Agreed implementation responsibilities, common indicators and sustained monitoring	Conflicting policies, enforcement gaps and unimplemented declarations	Determines the effectiveness of external pressure

The evidence base includes the Berlin International Sudan Conference Communiqué — April 2026, U.S. Treasury Enforcement Action — June 2026, UNHCR Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan — February 2026 and WHO/IPC Alert — October 2026. The implications and improvement conditions are analytical assessments, not additional official forecasts.

Scenario One — Protracted Fragmentation and the Consolidation of Competing Military Economies

The first and most immediately evidence-consistent pathway is the continuation of a territorially fragmented conflict in which the principal armed organisations retain sufficient resources to avoid decisive defeat but lack the capacity or political incentives necessary to impose a stable nationwide settlement. Under this scenario, military operations would fluctuate geographically and temporally, with periods of intensified fighting followed by local pauses, partial territorial adjustments and intermittent negotiations that fail to transform the underlying structures of coercive authority.

The central mechanism is the survival of competing military organisations alongside separate economic and administrative systems. A belligerent may lose access to a particular urban centre while preserving enough personnel, equipment and revenue to maintain operations elsewhere. Conversely, territorial advances may improve a force’s military position without providing the legal legitimacy, administrative capacity or public acceptance required to establish durable governance. Such circumstances can produce a prolonged equilibrium in which neither side possesses a sufficiently attractive alternative to continued armed competition.

The economic sustainability of this pathway depends upon the interaction between local revenue, military-associated commerce and access to external resources. Official United States enforcement actions during 2026 provide evidence of procurement and recruitment structures operating through several jurisdictions. These findings support the assessment that military resource generation is not restricted to the immediate productive capacity of territory held by the belligerents. They do not establish that support will remain uninterrupted through 2031, but they identify mechanisms through which continued military activity can remain possible despite domestic economic deterioration. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

The political consequence would be the progressive normalisation of divided authority. Administrations controlling separate areas might begin to develop routine procedures governing employment, commercial activity, local security and public services. Even without internationally recognised partition, such arrangements could acquire sufficient durability to create constituencies opposed to institutional reintegration. The conflict would then become more difficult to resolve because negotiations would concern not only future political leadership but also the redistribution of administrative powers and financial resources accumulated during the war.

Civilian recovery would be uneven. Some population centres might experience improvements in security, commercial activity and basic services, particularly where military operations decline. Other areas could remain exposed to attacks, displacement and interrupted access to infrastructure. National reconstruction programmes would struggle to operate consistently across the country because the practical authorities capable of authorising work, protecting personnel and maintaining restored assets would differ between territories.

This pathway also creates a risk of administrative irreversibility through cumulative separation. The longer separate procedures remain in operation, the more difficult reunification becomes. Public employees may receive compensation from different authorities, documentation systems may become incompatible, and local taxation may develop around the financial requirements of armed administrations. Reconstructing a common national framework would subsequently require negotiated arrangements extending beyond the ordinary demobilisation of combatants.

For neighbouring states, the principal consequence would be persistent rather than necessarily explosive instability. Host countries could face recurring refugee arrivals, intermittent cross-border insecurity and continued demand for humanitarian assistance. The UNHCR regional response plan’s US$1.6 billion financial requirement for 2026 illustrates the scale of the annual planning burden; it cannot be extrapolated unchanged across five years, but it demonstrates why a prolonged conflict would have significant cumulative financial implications. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

The strategic danger of this scenario is that protracted fragmentation may become increasingly self-sustaining even when neither side achieves a decisive military victory. The absence of victory does not automatically create pressure for compromise if the organisations involved can preserve their leadership, resources and territorial influence under continued conflict.

The scenario would gain support from evidence of repeated ceasefire failure, persistent procurement capacity, consolidation of separate administrations and the inability of civilian institutions to operate nationally. It would weaken if the parties accepted an enforceable security arrangement accompanied by verifiable reductions in external military supply, effective civilian participation and credible mechanisms for restoring national administrative authority.

Scenario Two — Negotiated De-escalation Followed by a Conditional Civilian Transition

The second pathway involves a negotiated reduction in hostilities that creates space for sustained humanitarian access, followed by a political process capable of progressively reconstructing national civilian authority. This outcome would not necessarily require immediate agreement on every question of security-sector reform or institutional representation. Its feasibility would depend on whether the parties and international mediators could establish a credible sequence through which immediate humanitarian and military commitments become the foundation for broader political arrangements.

The diplomatic record provides a concrete institutional starting point. The Berlin conference of April 2026 supported the development of an inclusive Sudanese political dialogue and recognised the African Union-led Quintet as a framework for assisting that process. Its communiqué also distinguished the work of the Quad concerning a ceasefire from the Quintet’s consultations concerning a future political dialogue. This separation is strategically useful because negotiating an immediate cessation of hostilities and reconstructing legitimate political institutions require different participants, procedures and implementation mechanisms. Co-Host Communiqué — International Sudan Conference Berlin — April 2026.

A viable de-escalation sequence would begin with commitments that can be independently observed. These include cessation of attacks, unhindered humanitarian movements consistent with international humanitarian law, protection of medical and essential civilian facilities, and the establishment of arrangements to investigate and address violations. Public declarations without verifiable implementation would have limited strategic value because the central problem is not the absence of diplomatic language but the ability to enforce commitments across the relevant armed organisations.

The proposed three-month humanitarian truce supported by the United States in June 2026 provides one possible negotiating model. Its value would lie less in the specific duration than in the opportunity to establish compliance procedures, improve civilian access and determine whether the principal commanders can control subordinate and allied formations. A truce that produces sustained reductions in attacks and meaningful humanitarian access could build confidence for more extensive negotiations. A truce that exists only as a political announcement, without independently observed improvements, would provide much weaker evidence of progress. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War and Worsening Humanitarian Crisis — U.S. Department of the Treasury — June 2026.

Political transition would require a broader framework than agreements among military commanders. Civilian organisations, regional communities, women, displaced populations and other constituencies affected by the conflict must have credible opportunities to participate in determining future institutions. This does not imply that every actor should possess identical negotiating authority or veto power. It means that an arrangement excluding significant civilian interests could struggle to achieve legitimacy even if it initially reduced fighting.

The central difficulty concerns sequencing security guarantees and political reform. Armed leaders may resist integration or demobilisation if they believe that compliance would leave them vulnerable to opposing forces. Civilians may reject a settlement that preserves military autonomy indefinitely. External actors may seek rapid agreement to reduce regional insecurity while failing to address the institutional conditions necessary for an accountable government.

A credible settlement would therefore require a conditional transition in which each stage creates observable obligations and practical safeguards for the next. The initial cessation of hostilities would need to be linked to humanitarian access and monitoring; broader security arrangements would need to address the command and accountability of armed formations; and political negotiations would need to establish legitimate civilian authority capable of supervising national institutions.

Reconstruction financing could support this sequence, but it should not become an unrestricted substitute for governance reform. Funding essential civilian services during a ceasefire is necessary to protect the population, while larger programmes intended to restore national economic institutions require appropriate oversight, procurement safeguards and an assessment of whether restored assets can remain operational.

The negotiated pathway would become more credible if official monitoring demonstrated sustained reductions in violence, functioning humanitarian access, participation by relevant civilian representatives and compliance by the principal armed organisations. It would weaken if ceasefires repeatedly collapsed, humanitarian access remained restricted or political negotiations were used to consolidate competing administrations without establishing a credible route towards national institutional compatibility.

The decisive requirement is that a ceasefire be designed as the beginning of an enforceable political process rather than being mistaken for the completion of one.

Scenario Three — Intensified Regionalisation and the Expansion of Cross-Border Security Crises

The third pathway concerns a deterioration in which Sudan’s war produces more frequent or serious security consequences in neighbouring states, creating international disputes that extend beyond population displacement and economic instability.

A wider regional crisis could emerge without an immediate formal declaration of war between Sudan and any neighbouring country. Repeated frontier incidents, verified cross-border military operations, the movement of armed formations, disputes involving foreign personnel or the escalation of allegations about military supply could cumulatively increase tensions. The importance of this pathway lies in the possibility that separate incidents become politically connected, reducing the willingness of governments to accommodate or resolve them individually.

Chad and Ethiopia would require particularly close observation because of their proximity to regions of active Sudanese fighting, while Egypt’s broader strategic relationship with Sudan creates a different form of exposure. Libya and the Sahel would be relevant primarily through the possible movement of people, commodities and armed networks, subject to reliable evidence of particular transactions or military relationships.

The existence of these vulnerabilities does not establish that regional war is inevitable. Neighbouring governments also possess strong incentives to avoid additional instability. Cross-border cooperation, humanitarian arrangements and diplomatic mediation can reduce escalation risks. The relevant analytical question is whether verified incidents and political reactions begin to overwhelm those stabilising incentives.

Regionalisation could also occur through economic channels. Disrupted cross-border trade, changing population movements and prolonged pressure on host communities can weaken regional resilience without triggering interstate military confrontation. The UNHCR 2026 regional plan already documents the importance of trade disruption and food and fuel inflation in affected host countries. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

A further potential pathway involves military-service networks and specialised expertise. Documented foreign recruitment arrangements supporting Sudan’s belligerents create a reason to investigate whether personnel and commercial relationships subsequently appear in other conflict environments. However, such proliferation must remain a conditional risk unless specific transfers or deployments are verified. The existence of a recruitment network supporting Sudan does not establish that it operates across the wider Sahel or that advanced Sudanese military equipment has been acquired by other armed organisations.

A regional escalation would impose new demands on European and international institutions. Humanitarian financing would need to address additional displaced populations, diplomatic mechanisms would have to manage bilateral disputes, and authorities responsible for financial enforcement would confront potentially more complex supply relationships. Maritime-security concerns could intensify if coastal infrastructure or commercial connectivity were affected, but Sudan-specific risks would still need to be distinguished from unrelated threats elsewhere in the Red Sea.

The regionalisation pathway would be confirmed by a sustained pattern of independently verified cross-border military incidents, documented expansion of prohibited armed networks or major deterioration in neighbouring countries’ capacity to manage displacement and essential services. It would weaken if incidents remained isolated, governments sustained effective diplomatic communication and humanitarian reception systems retained sufficient capacity.

Scenario Four — Military Predominance Without Inclusive Political Reconstruction

A fourth pathway involves one belligerent achieving substantially greater territorial and military predominance without establishing a legitimate and inclusive national political settlement.

This scenario differs from prolonged fragmentation because it assumes a meaningful change in the distribution of military power. It differs from negotiated de-escalation because territorial consolidation occurs primarily through military success rather than an enforceable political compromise.

A military victory could reduce the number of competing territorial authorities while leaving unresolved the grievances, institutional weaknesses and coercive relationships that contributed to the conflict. The restoration of a central military hierarchy might improve coordination of some administrative functions, but its durability would depend on accountability, the treatment of defeated or marginalised communities and the capacity to incorporate regional interests into a credible national framework.

The central risk is the substitution of military centralisation for political reconstruction. If the victorious organisation relies extensively on coercion, excludes important constituencies or fails to establish functioning civilian institutions, opposition may persist through local armed resistance, clandestine activity or renewed mobilisation. In this case, national territorial consolidation would not necessarily produce the end of organised violence.

A second challenge concerns the fate of allied armed movements. Organisations cooperating during wartime may possess distinct political objectives and expectations regarding post-war authority. Their willingness to accept integration, demobilisation or a reduction in autonomy cannot be assumed from their participation in a common military campaign.

A third problem is financial. Military consolidation may reduce some costs associated with competing administrations but leave the state confronting severe reconstruction needs, depleted public institutions and an economy weakened by prolonged insecurity. The ability to pay public employees, restore essential services and manage national revenues would become crucial to the credibility of the new governing order.

The scenario would gain support if one belligerent achieved sustained territorial predominance, competing command structures were materially weakened and national institutions began operating across previously contested regions. Its implications would remain unfavourable, however, if these developments were accompanied by widespread reprisals, exclusionary governance or continuing attacks against civilian populations.

Military predominance and political stabilisation must therefore be assessed as separate outcomes, even when the former produces a more coherent territorial map.

Table 8.2 — Strategic Pathways, 2026–2031: Comparative Assessment

Pathway	Governing mechanism	Evidence supporting its plausibility	Principal limiting factor	Current analytical standing
Protracted military and political fragmentation	Rival organisations preserve enough resources and territorial authority to continue operating	Documented procurement networks, ongoing armed conflict and competing political structures	Financial exhaustion, military losses and coordinated political pressure	Most consistent with the current structural evidence
Negotiated de-escalation and conditional civilian transition	Verifiable cessation of hostilities enables security arrangements and inclusive political negotiations	Existing international mediation initiatives, Berlin framework and proposals for a humanitarian truce	Weak enforcement capacity, fragmented commands and divergent political incentives	Plausible but dependent on significant behavioural change
Intensified regionalisation	Repeated cross-border incidents and expanding armed or economic networks create additional security crises	Regional displacement, frontier insecurity and international support networks	Neighbouring governments’ incentives to avoid escalation	Serious conditional risk, not a demonstrated inevitable outcome
Military predominance without inclusive reconstruction	One belligerent substantially weakens the other but retains a primarily coercive governing structure	Previous major territorial reversals establish that significant changes in military control are possible	Persistent regional opposition, institutional weakness and reconstruction burdens	Possible, but not established as the most likely outcome
Durable nationally integrated civilian recovery	Enforceable security arrangements, inclusive institutions and sustained economic reconstruction reinforce one another	Political frameworks and internationally supported civilian dialogue provide possible foundations	Requires sustained success across several mutually dependent processes	Strategically desirable but currently the least substantiated near-term transformation

These are analytical pathways rather than mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive probabilistic events. Military predominance could precede renewed fragmentation, and a negotiated ceasefire could coexist with unresolved territorial divisions. Assigning percentages without documented base rates or a reproducible forecasting process would create false precision.

The 2026–2031 Strategic Timeline: What Must Change, and When

The five-year horizon should not be divided into arbitrary annual predictions concerning the capture of cities, the outcome of military campaigns or the behaviour of foreign governments. Such predictions would require information about operational plans, military inventories, financing and political decisions that is neither sufficiently complete nor independently verifiable.

A more defensible approach is to define successive decision horizons in which the requirements for political stabilisation change. These horizons do not imply that developments will occur automatically on the indicated dates. They identify the types of evidence and institutional progress that would be necessary to support an improving outlook.

October 2026–June 2027: Establishing whether international pressure can change operational behaviour

The first period is decisive for determining whether existing diplomatic and regulatory initiatives can produce observable consequences. The international community has already established a framework for humanitarian coordination and political dialogue, while the United States and European Union have introduced measures intended to affect commercial and military support networks.

The immediate challenge is converting these instruments into evidence of changed behaviour. A reduction in documented attacks, reliable humanitarian access, verifiable restrictions on prohibited transfers and functioning channels for civilian engagement would indicate that external pressure was beginning to influence conditions. In contrast, continuing attacks against essential services, the discovery of additional procurement intermediaries and repeated failure to implement negotiated commitments would strengthen the assessment that the conflict’s principal incentives remain intact.

The 12 October 2026 IPC warning makes the humanitarian dimension particularly urgent. The combination of famine risk, drought, displacement and weakened healthcare creates the possibility of severe deterioration within a period shorter than the political timetable necessary for a national settlement. International engagement cannot therefore make life-saving assistance contingent upon completion of political negotiations. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — WHO — October 2026.

July 2027–December 2028: Testing the durability of political and administrative arrangements

If a meaningful reduction in hostilities occurs, the second period would test whether political agreements can survive the transition from negotiation to institutional implementation.

The central requirements would include effective command compliance, mechanisms addressing serious violations, the preservation of humanitarian access and procedures capable of restoring civilian administration in areas previously governed through competing military structures.

This phase would also expose disagreements within military coalitions and civilian political formations. Such disagreements are not inherently evidence of settlement failure; pluralism is a normal feature of political life. They become destabilising when disputes cannot be managed through agreed institutions and instead lead to the reactivation of independent armed structures.

The implementation of public financial management, property administration, policing and essential services would be especially important. These functions determine whether communities experience political transition as a material improvement in security and daily life.

International assistance should progressively shift from emergency substitution towards institutional recovery, but only where sufficient safeguards exist to prevent resources from reinforcing unaccountable coercive structures.

January 2029–December 2031: Determining whether Sudan has achieved durable recovery or entrenched fragmentation

By the final stage of the forecasting horizon, the principal question would concern the durability of the governing arrangements established during the preceding years.

A more positive trajectory would be characterised by functioning civilian institutions, reduced dependence on extraordinary humanitarian assistance, sustained access to basic services, an improving productive economy and arrangements capable of preventing renewed military competition.

A negative trajectory would feature separate and incompatible systems of territorial authority, recurring episodes of violence, persistent dependence on emergency relief and continuing financial or military relationships that enable armed organisations to operate independently of accountable national institutions.

This distinction is more useful than attempting to predict Sudan’s precise territorial configuration in 2031. A formally unified state can remain deeply unstable if its institutions lack legitimacy and functional capacity. Conversely, a country emerging from civil war may require temporary decentralised arrangements while constructing an enforceable constitutional and security order.

The decisive outcome is the restoration of a functioning political system capable of resolving disputes without renewed large-scale military competition.

Table 8.3 — Five-Year Milestones and Verifiable Conditions

Period	Central decision question	Evidence of positive change	Evidence of deterioration	Institutional consequence
Q4 2026–Q2 2027	Can parties be induced to change conduct?	Sustained humanitarian access, verified reduction in attacks and functioning negotiation channels	Continuing attacks, new prohibited procurement activity and rejection of monitoring	Establishes whether short-term pressure is effective
Q3 2027–Q4 2028	Can military commitments become enforceable institutions?	Documented command compliance, civilian participation and compatible administrative arrangements	Fragmentation of armed coalitions and failure of political implementation	Determines whether a ceasefire can evolve into a settlement
2029	Can infrastructure and productive activity recover sustainably?	Reliable services, functioning markets and reduced repeated displacement	Continued service failures and dependence on emergency substitutes	Determines whether territorial stabilisation is economically viable
2030	Can civilian political authority supervise national security institutions?	Accountable command arrangements, civilian oversight and credible dispute-resolution institutions	Armed autonomy and competing administrative structures	Determines the durability of institutional integration
2031	Has the conflict system been replaced by a functioning national order?	Sustained peaceful dispute resolution and continued civilian recovery	Recurrent warfare, entrenched fragmentation and renewed displacement	Determines the long-term strategic character of Sudan

The sequence is a conditional policy-assessment framework, not a prediction that these milestones will necessarily occur on the specified dates.

Early-Warning Indicators: Detecting Strategic Change Before It Becomes Irreversible

Monitoring Sudan’s future requires distinguishing indicators that reveal a change in the underlying conflict system from those that merely describe an individual incident. A major attack may be politically significant without demonstrating a durable change in the military balance. A new diplomatic statement may appear important without altering actual conduct. Conversely, improvements in less visible administrative or logistical functions may provide stronger evidence of stabilisation than highly publicised political announcements.

An effective early-warning system should therefore combine security, humanitarian, financial and institutional information.

The most consequential indicators are those capable of revealing whether the conditions sustaining conflict are strengthening or weakening. They include repeated violations of ceasefire commitments, evidence concerning external support networks, the establishment or dissolution of rival administrative institutions, changes in the accessibility of essential services and the capacity of neighbouring states to accommodate displaced populations.

The WHO’s October 2026 report establishes a concrete health baseline: 161 operational nutrition stabilisation centres received WHO training, supplies or related support during 2026, helping treat more than 26,000 children with severe acute malnutrition and medical complications between January and August. Changes in the number of functioning centres, treatment accessibility and programme funding could provide useful evidence of the system’s ability to respond, provided that increases in treatment numbers are not automatically interpreted as improved conditions. More treatments may reflect expanded access, worsening malnutrition or both. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — WHO — October 2026.

Similarly, displacement figures require careful interpretation. A decline in internally displaced persons may reflect return, onward movement, changed registration coverage or other factors. It does not by itself establish that the underlying conditions of safety have improved. The indicators should therefore combine population movement with service availability, protection and the sustainability of return.

Table 8.4 — Strategic Warning Indicators and Decision Triggers

Indicator	Record or observation required	Deterioration signal	Improvement signal	Recommended policy response
Attacks affecting civilians	Verified incident monitoring with consistent definitions	Sustained increase in attacks or affected regions	Sustained decline across comparable periods	Intensify protection diplomacy and accountability measures
Humanitarian access	UN and implementing-agency access reports	Repeated denials, attacks on personnel or prolonged route closures	Reliable delivery across previously inaccessible areas	Adjust diplomatic pressure and delivery arrangements
External procurement	Competent sanctions, customs and export-control findings	Verified successor networks or continuing prohibited supply	Demonstrated interruption of relevant functions	Refine targeted enforcement
Political fragmentation	Official administrative acts and verified institutional developments	Increasingly incompatible rival governance structures	Agreements restoring civilian administrative compatibility	Prioritise institutional negotiations
Healthcare availability	WHO and competent health-authority data	Additional facility closures and loss of critical services	Sustained increases in functioning service capacity	Redirect resources towards essential continuity
Severe malnutrition	IPC, WHO and UNICEF assessments	Expansion of severe conditions and inaccessible treatment	Improved nutrition indicators with reliable access	Scale integrated food, water and health intervention
Displacement	UNHCR and IOM data with clear categories	Additional forced movement and deteriorating host-country capacity	Sustained safe return and stable host-community services	Strengthen protection and host-country assistance
Cross-border security	Official incidents supported by independent evidence	Repeated attributable military incidents	Effective incident resolution and restored frontier cooperation	Activate regional diplomatic mechanisms
Commercial restrictions	Competent EU, UK and national enforcement records	Continued prohibited activity or substantial regulatory circumvention	Verified compliance and reduced unlawful transfers	Adjust enforcement priorities
Reconstruction viability	Infrastructure operators and humanitarian monitoring	Repeated failure of restored services	Sustained uptime and maintenance capacity	Expand recovery financing where conditions permit

Decision thresholds should be based on documented deterioration or sustained improvement, not arbitrary numerical scores. For example, verified obstruction of a critical humanitarian corridor may warrant immediate diplomatic action regardless of whether an annual incident threshold has been reached. A finding that essential supplies are being diverted through a prohibited network should trigger competent legal review even if the transaction has a relatively small monetary value.

The purpose of monitoring is to support timely decisions, not to construct an artificial index of national stability.

The Strategic Policy Architecture: Linking Humanitarian Protection, Military De-escalation and Economic Governance

The evidence developed throughout this assessment indicates that an effective international strategy cannot be constructed around a single instrument, whether a ceasefire proposal, an arms embargo, a financial-sanctions programme or a humanitarian appeal. Each addresses a different part of the conflict system, and each can fail when the institutional conditions necessary for its operation are absent.

The appropriate strategic architecture is an integrated but functionally differentiated response in which military de-escalation, economic enforcement, humanitarian access and political reconstruction reinforce one another without becoming legally or operationally confused.

This approach requires a division of responsibility among actors with appropriate mandates. Sudanese political and civilian participants must remain central to determining the country’s future institutions. The African Union and relevant regional bodies possess roles in political mediation and regional cooperation. The United Nations can support humanitarian coordination, monitoring and diplomatic engagement within its mandates. National governments and regional organisations can implement applicable sanctions, export controls and financial restrictions. Humanitarian organisations must retain the independence required to provide assistance according to need.

The institutional challenge is to create coordination without assuming that these actors possess identical powers or political objectives. A financial regulator should not be treated as a military mediator. A humanitarian organisation should not become an instrument for gathering military intelligence. A security institution should not assume the authority to determine the future constitutional arrangements of Sudan. The effectiveness of the overall strategy depends upon preserving these boundaries while ensuring that the relevant institutions can share appropriate information and align their actions.

The first policy priority: civilian protection and humanitarian access must remain unconditional legal obligations

The protection of civilians and the provision of humanitarian assistance cannot be postponed until a comprehensive political settlement is achieved. International humanitarian law continues to apply during hostilities, and a failure to reach agreement on a ceasefire does not suspend the relevant obligations.

The Berlin conference communiqué expressly recognised that sustained humanitarian access cannot be conditional on obtaining a truce or ceasefire. This establishes a sound policy principle because populations exposed to famine risk, medical-service collapse or interrupted water supplies cannot be expected to survive until political negotiations have reached an acceptable conclusion. Co-Host Communiqué — International Sudan Conference Berlin — April 2026.

The immediate operational objective should be verifiable improvement in access to affected populations, particularly in areas where food insecurity and healthcare constraints are most severe. Diplomatic pressure should address concrete access restrictions, attacks on personnel and impediments to essential relief operations.

Humanitarian financing must also be predictable. The WHO’s October appeal data demonstrate the vulnerability created when programmes operate with a large funding gap during a worsening emergency. A system that provides short-term resources without confidence in continued support may be unable to maintain specialised treatment, retain personnel or sustain essential services.

The principal risk is that access agreements become dependent on the changing political preferences of armed organisations. International negotiators should therefore seek arrangements whose practical operation can be monitored and whose implementation does not require humanitarian organisations to surrender their neutrality or independence.

The second policy priority: negotiated security commitments must be objectively enforceable

An agreement to stop fighting is valuable only insofar as it changes military conduct. The principal difficulty in Sudan is that command relationships extend across established armed organisations and allied formations whose interests may differ.

A credible cessation of hostilities would require clear identification of responsible commanders, mechanisms for communicating orders, arrangements for investigating reported violations and procedures for resolving disputes before they trigger renewed escalation.

The design of these mechanisms must reflect operational reality. A national-level signature cannot be assumed to guarantee compliance by every associated unit, and military movements should not automatically be interpreted as violations without reference to the agreement’s terms.

The objective is not to impose an unrealistically comprehensive settlement at the beginning of negotiations. It is to establish an enforceable framework capable of demonstrating whether the parties are willing and able to comply with limited commitments, creating a basis for progressively more demanding arrangements.

A humanitarian truce could therefore serve as a test of command compliance and political intent. But it would become strategically counterproductive if a temporary reduction in visible military activity were treated as sufficient evidence that deeper security-sector reform was no longer necessary.

The third policy priority: international military-support networks require coordinated, legally precise enforcement

Existing sanctions findings establish that relevant procurement and recruitment structures operate through international commercial relationships. Their existence creates opportunities for economic enforcement, but the effectiveness of such measures depends on the identification of specific transactions and the ability to prevent meaningful substitution.

The June 2026 United States Treasury action demonstrates the practical importance of targeting both industrial procurement and military-service recruitment. The European Union’s July 2026 measures targeting Sudanese-origin gold and specified mining chemicals provide a separate mechanism intended to restrict sources of conflict financing. Treasury Sanctions Networks Fueling Sudan’s Civil War — U.S. Treasury — June 2026; Sudan: Council Strengthens EU Sanctions Regime by Targeting Gold Trade — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

These instruments should not be evaluated as alternatives to one another. They address different functions and operate through different legal systems.

Effective coordination should focus on activities within the competence of the participating authorities: export authorisation, investigation of prohibited transactions, sanctions compliance, customs enforcement and lawful financial supervision. Information-sharing arrangements must preserve applicable legal protections and avoid treating unverified allegations as established violations.

The strategic objective is to increase the difficulty of sustaining prohibited military support without imposing indiscriminate restrictions on commercial activity essential to civilian recovery.

The fourth policy priority: civilian institutional restoration must begin before comprehensive reconstruction

Reconstruction is often discussed in terms of roads, electricity, hospitals and water facilities. These assets are indispensable, but their continued operation depends on institutions capable of maintaining them.

A national recovery programme must therefore address administrative records, professional staffing, operating expenditure, procurement procedures, property rights and the allocation of authority over essential services.

Physical reconstruction without institutional capacity risks creating repaired assets that cannot remain operational. Conversely, institutional reform that produces new legal arrangements but fails to restore services may lack credibility among populations whose immediate concerns involve access to water, healthcare, shelter and livelihoods.

The appropriate sequence is to protect and maintain essential services while gradually strengthening accountable civilian institutions. Where political authority remains contested, humanitarian and technical arrangements may be required to preserve services without conferring political recognition beyond their intended purpose.

International financing should reflect this distinction. Emergency spending can be justified by immediate humanitarian need, while larger long-term commitments require governance safeguards and realistic assessments of the recipient institutions’ capacity to operate the assets financed.

The fifth policy priority: neighbouring states require durable support rather than repeated emergency substitution

Sudan’s regional displacement crisis creates sustained demands on the public institutions of host countries. UNHCR’s 2026 regional response plan sought US$1.6 billion to support a planning population of 5.9 million people across the relevant regional response, with participation from 123 partners. These requirements demonstrate that the consequences of Sudan’s conflict are already distributed internationally. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

Support should distinguish immediate refugee protection from investment in the capacity of host communities. Emergency assistance is essential for new arrivals, while sustained population presence may require additional educational, medical, water and administrative infrastructure.

The strategic rationale is straightforward: deteriorating services in host countries can create additional economic and political pressures, even when those governments are not directly involved in Sudan’s military conflict.

Regional financing should therefore incorporate the needs of host populations alongside refugee protection, while avoiding the assumption that assistance will automatically prevent onward migration or eliminate security concerns.

Policy Trade-offs: Why More Coercive Measures Are Not Automatically More Effective

International actors face pressure to demonstrate action in response to severe violations and continuing humanitarian deterioration. Yet the apparent strength of a measure is not necessarily related to its practical effectiveness.

An expansive prohibition on commercial activity may appear decisive while generating extensive civilian costs and limited effects on armed organisations able to substitute suppliers. A narrowly targeted restriction may appear less forceful but produce greater operational consequences if it affects a critical service or financial relationship.

The same principle applies to political negotiations. An ambitious comprehensive agreement may be ineffective if the participants cannot implement its provisions, whereas a more limited arrangement providing verifiable protection and access may create meaningful immediate improvements.

The appropriate comparison therefore concerns authority, expected effect, implementation burden, time-to-effect, reversibility and second-order consequences.

Table 8.5 — Integrated Policy Options and Their Strategic Trade-offs

Policy option	Principal authority	Expected effect	Implementation burden and horizon	Reversibility	Principal downside
Unconditional humanitarian access arrangements	Parties to conflict under applicable law; humanitarian agencies and mediators	Immediate improvement in access and civilian protection where implemented	Negotiation and continued operational monitoring; effects potentially immediate	Operational arrangements can change, but legal obligations remain	Dependence on belligerent compliance and insecurity affecting personnel
Monitored humanitarian truce	Belligerents with agreed mediation and monitoring arrangements	Reduce violence and create conditions for further negotiation	Command compliance and verification; weeks to months after agreement	Truce provisions may expire or be renegotiated	Temporary pause may be exploited politically or militarily
Conditional ceasefire and security transition	Sudanese parties, with suitable regional and international support	Support durable reduction in hostilities and restructuring of security relationships	Substantial; months to years	Difficult to reverse without renewed instability	Insufficiently addressed armed autonomy may undermine implementation
Targeted procurement and recruitment sanctions	Competent national and regional authorities	Disrupt documented prohibited support functions	Investigations and enforcement; months	Individual designations and restrictions may be amended under applicable law	Substitution, evasion and inappropriate spillover onto lawful activity
Coordinated end-user and export-control oversight	National licensing and enforcement authorities	Reduce unlawful or unauthorised military transfers	Technical, legal and institutional; continuing	Licensing decisions subject to applicable review	Inconsistent implementation and administrative burdens
Protection and restoration of essential services	Civilian service providers, humanitarian organisations and authorised partners	Reduce civilian vulnerability and preserve economic activity	Technical and financial; immediate emergency work through multiyear recovery	Investments are partly irreversible	Restored assets remain vulnerable without security and maintenance
Civilian-led institutional dialogue	Sudanese civilian participants and relevant mediation institutions	Improve political legitimacy and identify a viable governance framework	Sustained negotiations and representation; months to years	Political arrangements may be revised through legitimate processes	Exclusion, fragmentation or lack of acceptance by armed actors
Regional host-country support	Host governments, UNHCR, donors and implementing partners	Improve refugee protection and public-service resilience	Sustained multi-year funding	Sudden reversal could harm dependent populations	Long-term fiscal burdens and uneven distribution of assistance
International monitoring and accountability	Competent UN, regional and national bodies	Improve documentation and consequences of violations	Access, expertise and legal procedure; months to years	Investigations have enduring implications	Incomplete evidence and politicisation can weaken confidence

The preferred approach is a sequenced combination, rather than a single maximal intervention. Immediate civilian protection and humanitarian access should proceed without waiting for a political settlement. Enforcement against documented prohibited activities should continue under applicable law. Political negotiations should develop enforceable commitments, and reconstruction financing should expand where security and institutional conditions permit.

The European Strategic Response: A Division of Responsibilities for Italy, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the European Union and NATO

The final strategic assessment requires distinguishing the contributions that European institutions can realistically provide. An effective European response cannot depend on the assumption that every government possesses the same interests, resources or legal authority. Nor should institutional coordination be confused with centralisation of all decision-making under a single actor.

The appropriate European approach is one of differentiated responsibility within a common strategic framework, enabling individual governments and organisations to employ their comparative capabilities while measuring results against shared objectives.

For Italy, the principal contribution should involve combining established humanitarian engagement with regional resilience and maritime-connectivity planning. Italy’s position within Mediterranean commercial and political systems gives it an interest in reducing instability affecting northeastern Africa and the wider Red Sea environment. Its operational involvement through humanitarian programmes provides a foundation for supporting essential civilian services, but the success of such engagement should be evaluated through the continuity of assistance and verified protection outcomes rather than shipment volumes alone.

For France, the central contribution should remain high-level diplomatic coordination, support for African-led mediation and the development of legally supportable accountability measures. France’s Security Council role provides an opportunity to maintain international political attention, but effective influence depends on coalition-building and the willingness of relevant actors to implement agreed measures. The priority should be to connect diplomatic initiatives with monitoring arrangements rather than relying on repeated declarations.

For Germany, the most important contribution lies in predictable humanitarian financing, institutional coordination and support for civilian recovery. The Berlin conference of April 2026 established Germany’s capacity to convene major international actors and mobilise substantial resources. The next test is whether donor coordination can improve operational access, preserve essential services and support an inclusive political process. The German Foreign Office has identified the Berlin Principles, supported by more than twenty states and institutions, as an important reference for future engagement, alongside the emergence of a joint appeal from Sudanese civilian actors. Germany and Sudan: Bilateral Relations — German Federal Foreign Office — 2026.

For the United Kingdom, the emphasis should be on coordinating Security Council diplomacy, national sanctions enforcement and humanitarian policy within an integrated regional strategy. The United Kingdom possesses important formal instruments, but their effectiveness depends on adequate institutional resources and the ability to connect diplomatic objectives with operational implementation. Its role should include support for monitoring, accountability and internationally coordinated economic restrictions, while preserving the legal distinction between sanctions designations and established criminal responsibility.

For the European Union, the principal contribution should involve the consistent implementation of restrictive measures, the coordination of humanitarian assistance and engagement with African institutions. The July 2026 gold restrictions demonstrate that the Union can act against defined economic functions associated with the conflict. Their strategic significance will depend on whether national authorities implement them effectively and whether subsequent assessments demonstrate reductions in prohibited activity. The Council’s framework must also be applied in a manner that protects lawful humanitarian operations and avoids unnecessary disruption to legitimate civilian economic recovery. Sudan: Council Strengthens EU Sanctions Regime by Targeting Gold Trade — Council of the European Union — July 2026.

For NATO, the relevant contribution should remain limited to activities consistent with its established mandates and political decisions. Sudan’s internal conflict does not create an automatic Alliance collective-defence obligation. Appropriate areas of cooperation may include engagement with African security institutions, analysis of military-technological developments and coordination concerning threats that materially affect allied security. Any additional activity would require separate consideration of legal authority, political consensus and operational necessity.

The significance of this differentiated approach is that Europe can influence the economic and diplomatic environment of Sudan’s conflict without assuming responsibility for directing Sudan’s internal political settlement or conducting military intervention. Its most valuable instruments are those capable of supporting African-led political engagement, constraining documented prohibited transactions and preserving civilian services.

Table 8.6 — European Strategic Responsibilities Through 2031

Actor	Primary responsibility	Near-term priority, 2026–2027	Medium-term priority, 2028–2029	Longer-term contribution, 2030–2031
Italy	Humanitarian engagement, Mediterranean and Red Sea resilience	Maintain essential assistance and monitor verified regional risks	Support sustainable civilian services and host-country resilience	Reinforce regional economic connectivity where security permits
France	Multilateral diplomacy and African security relationships	Support enforceable de-escalation and African-led mediation	Facilitate inclusive political arrangements and accountability	Contribute to durable diplomatic and institutional cooperation
Germany	Financing, donor coordination and institutional recovery	Improve humanitarian funding predictability and access	Support functioning civilian institutions and essential infrastructure	Contribute to sustainable public-service and economic recovery
United Kingdom	Security Council diplomacy, national sanctions and humanitarian coordination	Improve integrated implementation of diplomatic and economic measures	Support monitoring, political transition and regional coordination	Assist durable international institutional engagement
European Union	Collective economic regulation, humanitarian finance and diplomacy	Implement restrictions and coordinate assistance	Support accountable reconstruction and institutional compatibility	Develop sustainable economic and diplomatic relations under lawful governance
NATO	Collective security and authorised partner cooperation	Assess relevant security implications without assuming an intervention mandate	Provide appropriate cooperation where requested and authorised	Support regional security partnerships within agreed institutional frameworks

The table identifies policy functions rather than existing commitments to future deployments or expenditure. Its recommendations are conditional upon the legal competences and decisions of the relevant institutions.

The Critical Constraints on International Strategy

Even a carefully designed international response will face structural constraints that cannot be eliminated through better coordination alone.

The first concerns the distribution of coercive power. External actors can encourage negotiations, restrict certain transactions and support monitoring, but the implementation of a settlement ultimately requires cooperation from armed organisations capable of continuing hostilities. Diplomatic commitments cannot substitute for enforceable command decisions.

The second concerns the divergence of foreign interests. States with commercial, diplomatic or military relationships involving Sudan may differ in their preferred political outcomes or assessments of regional security. A statement supporting peace does not demonstrate agreement about the means necessary to achieve it.

The third concerns incomplete knowledge of the conflict economy. Official investigations have identified important procurement and recruitment networks, but they do not provide a complete, audited account of every transaction sustaining the belligerents. Sanctions policy must therefore remain adaptable, legally precise and based on verifiable evidence rather than assertions of comprehensive coverage.

The fourth concerns the limits of reconstruction under continued insecurity. Investment in essential services can produce meaningful benefits, but repeated attacks, weak administrative authority and shortages of personnel may undermine its sustainability. International donors must distinguish projects capable of operating under current conditions from those requiring a more stable political and security framework.

The fifth concerns the difficulty of measuring strategic change. Some improvements may be visible through humanitarian access, service availability and reductions in documented attacks. Others, including military cohesion, procurement substitution and the durability of political relationships, may be difficult to verify through public records.

The appropriate response to these limitations is not to abandon forecasting or policy evaluation. It is to adopt narrower claims, identify consequential gaps and revise judgments when new evidence becomes available.

The Cost of Strategic Inaction: What Can Be Established Without Unsupported Financial Forecasts

The economic consequences of prolonged conflict will depend on the duration of violence, the condition of infrastructure, the extent of displacement, changes in productive activity and the resources available for reconstruction.

A precise estimate of Sudan’s total economic loss through 2031 would require a credible baseline for national production, asset damage, population movements, public expenditure and future conflict conditions. The official record examined does not provide a sufficiently complete and compatible dataset to justify a single national monetary forecast or a simulated probability distribution.

Nevertheless, several important financial and institutional relationships can be established.

The UNHCR regional plan identified US$1.6 billion in financial requirements for 2026. This represents a defined annual planning requirement, not a fixed future expenditure rate. Over a five-year horizon, equivalent annual requirements would imply very substantial cumulative demands, but actual needs could rise or fall according to displacement, inflation, programme design, donor commitments and political developments. Sudan Regional Refugee Response Plan 2026 — UNHCR — February 2026.

Similarly, the WHO’s October 2026 appeal demonstrates that even relatively narrowly defined critical health programmes may face serious financing gaps. With 23% of its US$97.7 million appeal funded, the reported amount secured was approximately US$22.5 million, leaving approximately US$75.2 million unfunded, calculated from the published percentage and total. Because the percentage is rounded, these derived values are approximate rather than audited dollar amounts. IPC Sudan Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — WHO — October 2026.

The significance of these figures is not that future requirements can be predicted by multiplying current appeals across successive years. It is that prolonged insecurity creates recurrent financial obligations while simultaneously weakening the productive and institutional capacity needed to reduce dependence on those obligations.

The long-term cost also includes losses that are difficult to measure through annual budgets. Interrupted education can affect future labour-force capabilities. Damage to public administration can raise the cost of reconstruction. Prolonged displacement can undermine community institutions and create competing demands on host-country services. Agricultural disruption can affect future productive capacity as well as immediate food availability.

The cumulative consequences may therefore exceed the financial value of damaged infrastructure or the total funding requested by humanitarian organisations, but a precise national valuation requires evidence not established by the present official record.

Table 8.7 — Verified Financial Baselines and the Limits of Five-Year Extrapolation

Financial indicator	Verified amount	Reference period	Appropriate interpretation	Inappropriate inference
UNHCR regional refugee response requirements	US$1.6 billion	2026 plan	Funding sought for the defined regional response	Fixed annual expenditure through 2031
International humanitarian commitments at Berlin	Approximately €1.5 billion	April 2026 announcement	Collective pledges associated with the conference	Verified disbursement or additional funding beyond related announcements
EU and member-state commitments within Berlin total	More than €811 million	April 2026	European portion of the collective commitments	Amount to add again to the overall €1.5 billion
WHO Sudan humanitarian appeal	US$97.7 million	2026 appeal	Organisation-specific programme funding requirement	Total national health-sector reconstruction cost
WHO reported funding coverage	23%	October 2026	Rounded share of WHO appeal funded	Percentage of Sudan’s total healthcare requirements financed
WHO approximate funded amount	US$22.5 million	Calculated from October 2026 reporting	Derived estimate using reported percentage	Independently audited expenditure
WHO approximate unfunded amount	US$75.2 million	Calculated from October 2026 reporting	Derived gap using reported percentage	Exact accounting balance

Sources: UNHCR Regional Response Plan — February 2026; Berlin International Sudan Conference Communiqué — April 2026; WHO Food Insecurity and Malnutrition Alert — October 2026.

Final Strategic Net Assessment: Sudan’s Future and the Emerging International Security Order

Sudan’s war demonstrates a major transformation in the contemporary relationship between military power, state authority and international economic interdependence. The conflict is no longer intelligible through the conventional assumption that the organisation controlling the largest amount of territory will necessarily determine the country’s political future. Modern military capabilities permit armed organisations to exercise influence far beyond their immediate positions, while internationally distributed supply relationships can sustain military activity despite severe domestic economic deterioration.

This transformation has altered the conditions under which political settlements become possible. Military superiority can improve negotiating leverage, but it cannot automatically establish legitimate civilian authority. Financial restrictions can disrupt particular transactions, but they cannot substitute for a political framework accepted by the relevant Sudanese constituencies. Humanitarian financing can preserve lives and institutional capacity, but it cannot guarantee recovery while attacks, displacement and infrastructure destruction continue.

The central long-term danger is the establishment of a self-reproducing conflict system in which territorial fragmentation, external resource flows and weakened civilian institutions reinforce one another. Under such conditions, individual military victories and temporary diplomatic agreements may change the intensity or location of violence without eliminating the organisational foundations of the war.

For the African region, this creates persistent exposure through displacement, disrupted commerce, frontier insecurity and the potential transfer of military expertise. For Europe, the consequences concern humanitarian responsibilities, economic governance, Mediterranean and Red Sea resilience and the effectiveness of international sanctions and export-control mechanisms. For the wider international system, Sudan tests whether multilateral institutions can address armed conflict sustained through complex interactions among recognised states, armed non-state organisations and commercial networks operating across jurisdictions.

The final assessment rests on five judgments.

Military fragmentation is the most immediate structural threat to Sudan’s national recovery. The survival of competing armed organisations and their associated administrative structures makes the restoration of unified authority difficult even when individual territorial campaigns end.

External military and commercial relationships can influence the duration of the conflict, but they do not establish a single coherent foreign command system. International responsibility must be assessed according to documented conduct, applicable law and the degree of control or authorisation established by competent evidence.

Civilian infrastructure and human capital are decisive determinants of long-term stability. The restoration of water, healthcare, education, energy and productive activity is necessary for sustainable return, functioning public administration and political legitimacy.

Regional security consequences will depend on the interaction between direct military incidents and slower institutional pressures. Refugee movements, host-country service capacity, cross-border trade and financial networks can generate substantial destabilisation even without formal interstate warfare.

The effectiveness of international intervention will depend upon implementation rather than the volume of diplomatic or regulatory activity. Agreements must change military conduct; sanctions must demonstrably affect prohibited support; humanitarian financing must reach affected populations; and reconstruction must produce services capable of functioning over time.

The most credible policy direction is therefore a sustained, differentiated and evidence-based international effort that combines immediate civilian protection, enforceable de-escalation, targeted economic measures and support for a genuinely Sudanese-led political process.

A five-year forecast cannot establish with certainty whether such an effort will succeed. The documented record supports the conclusion that prolonged fragmentation remains the strongest structural concern, while a negotiated transition remains possible if the relevant military, political and international actors accept obligations that can be independently verified and implemented.

The decisive strategic choice for Sudan and its international partners is whether the resources currently sustaining competing systems of military authority can be redirected towards a political order capable of protecting civilians, governing territory through accountable institutions and restoring the economic foundations of national sovereignty.

The significance of the Sudanese conflict extends beyond the eventual distribution of power among its present belligerents. It concerns the capacity of the international security system to prevent technological reach, commercial intermediation and fragmented authority from becoming mutually reinforcing foundations of prolonged warfare.

By 2031, the most meaningful measure of success will not be the defeat of a particular military platform, the announcement of a new governing authority or the numerical expansion of international sanctions. It will be whether Sudan possesses functioning civilian institutions capable of maintaining essential services, exercising accountable authority and resolving political disputes without the renewed mobilisation of rival armed organisations.

That is the distinction between a temporary interruption of war and the reconstruction of peace.

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