UN says drone strike destroys aid truck supplies in North Darfur

# UN says drone strike destroys aid truck supplies in North Darfur

A drone attack hit an aid truck in Sudan's North Darfur state and destroyed all the supplies on board, according to the UN refugee agency, in the latest sign that humanitarian transport remains exposed as the country's war spreads and civilian need intensifies.

The vehicle was operated by UNHCR and was carrying emergency shelter kits to Tawila when it came under attack on Friday, the agency said. Tawila is home to more than 700,000 displaced people who fled fighting elsewhere in Darfur. The driver escaped without injury, but the fire caused by the strike destroyed the cargo, leaving the intended recipients without shelter materials the agency had planned to deliver.

UNHCR condemned the attack and said the loss would leave 1,314 families in Tawila in desperate conditions without shelter. The agency did not identify who carried out the strike. That omission matters because both the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces have increasingly used drones in the conflict, and the reporting cited in the source says drone strikes by both sides have escalated in recent months.

The attack fits into a broader pattern of intensifying violence across Sudan. The war that erupted in April 2023 has already displaced more than 11 million people and created the world's largest displacement and hunger crisis, according to the evidence in the packet. The UN says nearly 700 civilians have been killed in drone strikes by both sides since January alone, underscoring how the use of remotely guided weapons has expanded beyond front-line battlefield exchanges and into areas where civilians and aid workers are trying to move.

North Darfur has become especially fragile after the fall of El-Fasher, the state's capital and the army's last stronghold in the region. More than 127,000 people fled the city after it was taken by paramilitary forces in October, and reports of mass killings, sexual violence, looting and rape followed the takeover. Fighting has since spread into neighboring Kordofan and the southeastern Blue Nile state, widening fears that the war is becoming more fragmented and harder to contain.

The humanitarian consequences remain severe. A UN Food and Agriculture Organization assessment cited in the source says 28.9 million people, or about 62 percent of Sudan's population, face acute food insecurity, including 10.2 million in severe food insecurity. Famine has already been declared in El-Fasher and Kadugli, and 20 other areas in Darfur and Kordofan were identified as at risk in a UN-backed assessment.

UNHCR described repeated attacks on humanitarian operations as particularly abhorrent and said it had deep concern about the rising use of drones. The agency's language reflects the practical problem now confronting relief groups: even when roads are open enough to move supplies, a single strike can destroy a shipment before it reaches families who have already been uprooted by the war.

The latest attack on the aid truck does not change the scale of the conflict on its own, but it does show how violence is now landing directly on the machinery of relief. In a state where displacement is already massive and shelter needs are acute, the loss of a single delivery can translate into thousands of people left exposed to the elements while the war continues to move across Darfur.