A United Nations fact-finding mission has concluded that a transnational network of companies and individuals — operating from the United Arab Emirates, Colombia, Chad and other countries — supplied the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) with weapons, military contractors, training and logistical support, significantly prolonging Sudan's devastating civil war. The report, published Thursday by the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for the Sudan, a body mandated by the UN Human Rights Council, found "reasonable grounds to believe" that the network enabled increasingly sophisticated RSF military operations with catastrophic consequences for civilians.

The war in Sudan erupted in April 2023 following a violent power struggle between the national army and the RSF, a paramilitary force that grew out of the notorious Janjaweed militias. The conflict has killed at least 59,000 people — with some estimates placing the death toll above 150,000 — displaced more than 13 million people internally and forced roughly 4.5 million to flee the country, pushing large swaths of the nation into famine. The investigators specifically linked foreign-trained fighters to two 2025 massacres at Zamzam displacement camp and the city of El Fasher, in Sudan's western Darfur region, where survivors reported RSF fighters killing civilians in their homes and in the streets. Satellite imagery has since appeared to show bodies being disposed of in mass graves or burned. Mission expert Mona Rishmawi noted that the foreign support contributed to RSF operations at Zamzam and later at El Fasher, where investigators documented conduct bearing the hallmarks of genocide.

The UAE, named as playing "a significant role" in financing, recruiting and deploying foreign military contractors to the RSF, again denied providing weapons or military equipment to any party in the conflict, reaffirming its neutrality. The report also found that Colombian contractors were involved in advanced weapons and drone systems, corroborating an earlier investigation by the Associated Press revealing that Colombian mercenaries had trained child soldiers for the RSF. Chad, Colombia and the UAE cooperated with the investigators, while Ethiopia, Libya, South Sudan and Somalia provided no substantive response. Neither the Sudanese army nor the RSF cooperated with the inquiry. The report noted that drone attacks by both sides on civilians and civilian infrastructure may constitute war crimes.

In response to the findings, senior US officials — including the American ambassador to the United Nations and a senior adviser on Arab and African affairs — published a joint article calling for a comprehensive arms embargo covering all Sudanese territory. The existing UN arms embargo, established under Security Council Resolution 1591 of 2005, applies only to the Darfur region and has not been updated to reflect the conflict's expansion into areas such as Kordofan and Blue Nile state. The G7, including the United States, has called on the Security Council to extend the embargo nationwide. The fact-finding mission echoed that call, urging the council to act: "The weapons, financing, personnel and technology that sustain this war must be constrained."