Drone warfare emerges as deadliest threat to civilians in Sudan

Sudan’s war has increasingly turned to drone attacks that experts and monitors say are driving civilian deaths and broadening the scale of harm, with the United Nations human rights chief this week calling for steps to prevent the transfer of drone technology into the conflict. Volker Türk said “Armed drones have now become by far and away the leading cause of civilian deaths,” describing the devices as accounting for more than 80% of conflict-related deaths. He said drones killed at least 880 civilians between January and April, according to the account he gave this week.

The figures cited by Türk come as the conflict, which began in April 2023, has killed at least 59,000 people, displaced about 13 million, and pushed parts of Sudan into famine conditions, according to the same reporting. In recent weeks, the RSF carried out drone attacks on Khartoum International Airport and other areas near the capital, which the army seized control of last year. Analysts said foreign-supplied advanced drone technology lets the warring parties extend strikes into densely populated areas, while complicating peace efforts and raising fears of a broader proxy conflict.

Experts said the battlefield impact is tied not only to the ability to strike but to how drones are used to support wider ground operations. Jalale Getachew Birru, an East Africa senior analyst at the U.S.-based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data project, said, “On the battlefield, drones have emerged as a force multiplier, enabling ground offensives and weakening enemy defenses.” Birru said both the army and RSF use drones to secure contested territory, disrupt mobilization, and spread insecurity in areas controlled by rivals.

Researchers also linked the increase in drone activity to rising death tolls. ACLED said at least 2,670 people, including combatants and civilians, were killed in 2025, and it found a 600% increase in drone-related deaths and an 81% increase in drone attacks compared with the previous year. Türk said most civilian deaths from drone attacks occurred in the Kordofan region in central Sudan.

The U.N. human rights chief cited multiple incidents in Kordofan, including drone strikes on May 8 in South Kordofan and near el-Obeid in North Kordofan, which Türk said reportedly killed 26 civilians. Türk also said more than 70 people were killed in drone attacks on densely populated areas in Kordofan earlier this year, citing the Sudan Doctors Network. Separately, Emergency Lawyers said on Tuesday that nine drone attacks on civilian vehicles had killed at least 36 people over the previous 10 days across seven provinces; the group blamed both the army and RSF.

Emergency Lawyers said some of the drones used visual monitoring technology capable of distinguishing targets, raising concerns in the group’s view that the attacks may not have been indiscriminate. The cluster reporting also described drones as being used against civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, dams, schools, markets, and displacement camps. Researchers said the targeting of such sites reflects the way drones are integrated into both sides’ operational planning.

Several analysts said RSF drone usage has expanded in recent months, with the paramilitary beginning to use drones widely only last year. Gabriella Tejeda, a research associate at The Soufan Center, said that while both the army and RSF compete to obtain new drone models, the RSF has modified drones and is “increasingly competing to acquire newer, more sophisticated models,” with the UAE likely supplying them. The United Arab Emirates has denied supplying drones to the RSF, according to the reporting.

Tejeda and other researchers also described external technology as a key part of the RSF’s capabilities. Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of the Humanitarian Research Lab at the Yale School of Public Health, said the RSF is backed by external technology, “particularly from the UAE,” and that satellite imagery shows its use of Chinese-made CH-95 and FH-95 drones, which Raymond described as roughly the size of small aircraft. In the case of el-Fasher city in North Darfur, where at least 6,000 people were killed over three days last year, Raymond said RSF drones shut down communications of civilians “crying for help” and targeted people where a signal was detected, adding that the RSF couldn’t have seized the city without these capabilities.

Raymond said the way drones were used in el-Fasher was distinct, noting that it reflected “this layered, hunter-killer concept of operations to kill people, basically in a kill box or trapped inside a wall,” and he discussed how the approach was intended to prevent people from signaling for help. He said U.N. experts described the violence there as having “hallmarks of genocide,” as reflected in the reporting.

The reporting also described accusations aimed at the army’s drone use. The army’s drone technology has been blamed for striking civilian infrastructure such as Al Daein Teaching Hospital in East Darfur, where at least 64 people were killed; the army officially denied responsibility, and two military officials previously said the intended target had been a nearby police station. Raymond said the army has increased drone strikes on protected infrastructure such as schools and markets in the past four to six months, and he said the army has maintained that it doesn’t target civilian infrastructure.

Data cited in the reporting also pointed to different supply networks supporting each side. The reporting said ACLED found earlier this month that the army’s drone technology is supplied by Turkey, Russia, Iran and Egypt, while the RSF is supplied via networks linked to the UAE through regional transit points including Ethiopia, Chad and Libya. The Sudanese government has accused neighboring Ethiopia of being behind recent drone attacks on sites including the Khartoum airport and accused the UAE of supplying drones; both Ethiopia and the UAE denied the allegations.

Tejeda said the Ethiopian-UAE relationship made the Sudanese government’s allegations difficult to dismiss, saying, “Ethiopia is a central partner to the UAE, so the allegations are not unfounded and reflects an attempt by the UAE to try to influence the outcome of the war.” Birru and Raymond said that while cross-border drone activity may have contributed to rising civilian deaths, it is difficult to confirm how much of that increase should be attributed to foreign involvement rather than to other battlefield factors. Tejeda said “Both the warring parties’ battle tempo only increasing, and their backers actively still investing in the war,” indicates neither side is seeking a resolution.