At least 35 people were killed Sunday when the Sudanese army struck a traditional court in western Darfur with drones, a rights group said.
The Emergency Lawyers, which has documented violence by both the army and its rival paramilitaries throughout the three-year conflict, said the strike hit the court in the village of Garra al-Zawaya in North Darfur state at around 1 p.m. local time (11 a.m. GMT), as civilians had "gathered to attend hearings on local cases and disputes."
The village is under the control of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which have been locked in a brutal conflict with the army since April 2023.
"The court session was being held under a tree with the participation of local community leaders," a witness from the area told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.
Among those killed were "four tribal leaders and two RSF commanders," the witness added.
There was no immediate response from the army. The RSF's self-declared government condemned the attack as "a horrific crime," saying 37 people had been killed and 50 others wounded.
Garra al-Zawaya lies near the town of Kabkabiya in North Darfur, about 150 kilometers (93 miles) west of el-Fasher, the army's last stronghold in Darfur before it was captured by the RSF in a bloody offensive last October.
U.N. investigators have said violence linked to the RSF's siege and capture of el-Fasher bears "the hallmarks of genocide."
Following its takeover of the city, the RSF, which emerged from the Janjaweed militia accused of atrocities in Darfur in the early 2000s, consolidated control over much of the region.
Since the el-Fasher campaign, both sides have increasingly relied on drone warfare. According to the United Nations, more than 1,000 civilians were killed in drone strikes during the first five months of this year.
Last week, after losing control of a key highway linking the capital Khartoum and the city of el-Obeid, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo released a video message in which he told his fighters to consider themselves "unleashed" in their war against the army.
El-Obeid, the largest city in the southern Kordofan region, has come under intense drone attacks in recent weeks, prompting the U.N. to issue a "red alert" over the unfolding "catastrophe" there, where the RSF has sought to reimpose a blockade and is feared to be preparing a ground offensive.
The U.N. has repeatedly warned that RSF advances in el-Obeid and the wider Kordofan region could lead to mass atrocities.
The war between Daglo and his former ally, army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced millions and created what the United Nations describes as the world's largest hunger and displacement crises.
Both sides have been accused of committing war crimes, including indiscriminate attacks on civilians, but the RSF has been particularly accused of systematic sexual violence, looting and mass atrocities.
