PORT SUDAN: Half a million people returned to the Sudanese capital Khartoum in July alone, the United Nations’ migration agency said Monday, as the city begins to recover even as the country’s devastating war rages elsewhere.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said an estimated 500,074 individuals made their way back to the city last month — a staggering 400 percent increase compared with June.
The spike in returns came four months after Sudan’s army recaptured the city from its rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in March, and as the government launches reconstruction efforts.
Across Sudan, around two million people have returned to their homes over the past nine months, according to the UN. Nearly half of those have resettled in the central Al-Jazira state, followed by Khartoum with over 600,000 returnees.
The UN has however said the situation remains highly precarious, with basic services limited and the risk of renewed violence still present.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been ravaged by a war that erupted with a power struggle between army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
In a series of offensives, Burhan’s forces regained central Sudan this year, leaving the RSF with control over the western Darfur region — where it has conquered all but one state capital — and parts of southern Kordofan.
The fighting has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions, including about four million from the capital alone.
While relative calm has been restored in Khartoum, fierce fighting continues in Darfur and Kordofan, where the RSF has focused military operations.
Hundreds have been reported killed in recent months, and civilians in El-Fasher say the paramilitaries are currently waging their fiercest ever assault on the North Darfur state capital.
The war has decimated the northeast African country’s infrastructure and created what the UN describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crises.
Approximately 10 million people are currently displaced within Sudan, while an additional four million have fled to neighboring countries, according to the UN.
