The United Nations has warned that Sudan's strategic city of El-Obeid could soon come under siege as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) mass troops around the city ahead of what aid officials fear could be a major ground assault.
The warning has raised concerns that El-Obeid, the capital of North Kordofan State, could suffer the same fate as Al Fasher in Darfur, where the RSF captured the city after a prolonged siege. The UN has said the October assault on Al Fasher bore "the hallmarks of genocide."
Home to around 500,000 residents and nearly 100,000 people displaced by fighting elsewhere in Sudan, El-Obeid has in recent weeks endured its most intense RSF attacks since the conflict began.
Mohamed Refaat of the International Organization for Migration also warned the city is nearing a total siege, with civilians "soon unable to leave or return".
Al Fasher replica
Without an urgent increase in humanitarian assistance, conditions in El-Obeid could "within weeks" resemble those experienced in Al Fasher, where civilians reportedly survived on animal feed during an 18-month siege, he said.
The Sudanese army broke an earlier RSF siege of El-Obeid in February last year and has tried to prevent the paramilitary group from tightening its grip once again.
Recent strikes from RSF have damaged the city's main power station and fuel depots, plunging neighbourhoods into darkness and disrupting water supplies after pumps were forced offline.
El-Obeid occupies a strategic crossroads connecting army-held territory in central and eastern Sudan, including Khartoum.
The city is also home to an infantry division, an air base, a major oil pipeline and one of Sudan's largest gum arabic trading centres.
With fighting intensifying and access severely restricted, independent reporting from El-Obeid has become increasingly difficult.
The UN has warned that more than 6,000 people were killed in the first three days after El-Fasher fell to the RSF, while Western governments have cautioned that similar atrocities could unfold if El-Obeid is captured.
