A drone strike hit a war-torn United Nations facility Sudan On Saturday, six peacekeepers were killed, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said.
The strike hit a peacekeeping logistics base in the city of Kadugli, in the central region of Kordofan, Guterres said in a statement.
Eight other peacekeepers were injured in the strike. All the victims are Bangladeshi nationals serving with the UN Interim Security Force in UNISFA Abyeira.
“Attacks against United Nations peacekeepers can be war crimes under international law,” Guterres said, and called for those responsible for the “unjustifiable” attack to be held accountable.
The Sudanese military blamed him for the attack Rapid Support ForcesThe RSF, a notorious paramilitary group that has been at war with the army for control of the country for more than two years. RSF had no immediate comment.
This attack “clearly shows the subversive attitude of the rebel militias and those behind them,” the military said in a statement. The military posted a video on social media showing plumes of dense black smoke over what it said was a UN facility.
Oil-rich Abyei is a disputed region between Sudan and South Sudan, where the UN mission has expanded since South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011.
Guterres also called for an immediate ceasefire in Sudan to allow for a “comprehensive, inclusive and Sudanese-owned political process” to resolve the conflict in the northeast African country.
Sudan plunged into chaos in April 2023 a power struggle it erupted into open fighting between the military and the RSF in the capital Khartoum and elsewhere in the country. If the conflict die More than 40,000 people – a figure rights groups consider a significant underestimate.
Fighting has recently focused on Kodrofan, especially since the RSF took control el-Fasher, the last stronghold of the military in the western region of Darfur.
The war has devastated urban centers and marked atrocities including mass rape and ethnically motivated killings that the UN and rights groups have called war crimes and crimes against humanity, particularly in the western region of Darfur.
The war has also created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis and pushed parts of the country into starvation.