The battle for Kordofan: The hall linking Sudan’s east and west | Sudan conflict News

Fighting in Sudan’s Kordofan area has intensified since late 2025, turning it into one of many major battlegrounds within the conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), now in its fourth 12 months.

The huge area, which includes North, West and South Kordofan states, lies the place the 2 sides’ areas of management meet, between the army-held central area and the RSF-controlled Darfur within the West. In latest months, the SAF has pushed the RSF out of a lot of North Kordofan.

The battle is more and more being fought from the air. Drone strikes on cities in North Kordofan are rising extra frequent and lethal, and civilian roads has been hit throughout the area.

Since the conflict started in April 2023, one in 5 recorded assaults in Sudan has taken place in Kordofan.

Al Jazeera maps the place the combating is concentrated in Kordofan and throughout Sudan, and the displacement that has adopted.

Who controls what on the bottom?

Sudan is broadly divided between the 2 sides. The SAF controls the capital, Khartoum, and many of the north, east and centre, whereas the RSF controls the west, together with virtually all of Darfur and elements of Kordofan. Smaller armed teams, together with the RSF-allied Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N), maintain pockets of territory within the south.

The military has the higher hand within the north, the RSF within the west, and South Kordofan stays contested.

Where have most assaults occurred?

According to an Al Jazeera evaluation of information from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED), an unbiased dispute monitor, there have been 14,648 recorded assaults between the beginning of the conflict on April 15, 2023, and September 19, 2026.

The 4 most affected states embody:

• Khartoum: The capital area has seen essentially the most, with 5,719 assaults, or 39 % of the full, virtually thrice as many as North Darfur, the second-highest
• North Darfur has witnessed 1,999 assaults (13.7 %)
• Gezira state has seen 1,435 assaults (9.8 %)
• Kordofan emerged as a significant centre for combating. North, South and West Kordofan collectively recorded 2,876 assaults, or about 19.7 % of all recorded assaults, placing the area behind solely Khartoum when thought of collectively.

Who has carried out essentially the most assaults?

The SAF is related to the biggest share of recorded assaults between April 15, 2023 and September 19, 2026, accounting for simply over half (52 %), in contrast with simply over a 3rd (34.7 %) for the RSF and 13.3 % for different actors.

The steadiness of assaults has shifted over time. The SAF was related to extra recorded assaults than the RSF within the first 12 months and a half of the conflict, earlier than the RSF overtook it in variety of assaults from late 2024 to mid-2025.

Since August 2025, the 2 sides’ month-to-month assault counts have been nearer, with the SAF typically recording barely extra, at the same time as the general variety of assaults has fallen sharply.

Where have assaults in Kordofan occurred?

After the autumn of el-Fasher, the final main Darfur metropolis held by the military and its allies, in October 2025, consideration shifted to Kordofan. The area sits between RSF-held Darfur and the army-held centre, north and east, forming a hall between the 2 sides’ heartlands.

Kordofan’s three states recorded 2,717 assaults: North Kordofan had 1,205 (44 %), South Kordofan 789 and West Kordofan 723. Adding Abyei, a disputed oil-rich space on the Sudan-South Sudan border that was traditionally a part of Kordofan, brings the full to 2,878.

The focus of assaults differs from state to state. In North Kordofan, Sheikan locality alone accounted for 497 assaults, or 41 % of the state’s whole. Sheikan is house to the state capital, el-Obeid, a industrial and administrative hub linking central Sudan with the west. Taking town would open a route east in the direction of Khartoum for the RSF.

On September 9, a drone strike on a school in el-Obeid tore the roof off the constructing and killed a safety guard, the faculty’s dean, Abdel Aziz al-Sheikh, advised Reuters.

“As you’ll be able to see, the complete school is destroyed and we really feel that our goals are destroyed, ⁠our future is destroyed,” Omnia Aboul Gassim, a pupil who had sat her exams on the el-Obeid school simply in the future earlier than the assault, advised Reuters.

In South Kordofan, Dilling locality was the primary hotspot, with 242 assaults (31 %), adopted by Kadugli with 107 (14 %) and Al Quoz with 94 (12 %).

Attacks in West Kordofan had been unfold extra evenly throughout localities. Babnusa recorded essentially the most, with 142, adopted by En Nuhud (119), Al Khiwai (112) and Abu Zabad (111).

ACLED has recorded no less than 12,314 reported fatalities in Kordofan since April 2023.

The SAF was related to 1,323 assaults (46 %) throughout all three states in Kordofan, in contrast with 920 (32 %) for the RSF and 633 (22 %) for different actors.

How many individuals are displaced?

About 8.6 million individuals stay internally displaced throughout Sudan, in accordance with the most recent United Nations figures, down from a peak of 11.6 million in January 2025 as thousands and thousands returned house to areas retaken by the military. New displacement continues in Kordofan, Darfur and Blue Nile.

Darfur hosts the biggest concentrations of internally displaced individuals (IDPs), notably South and North Darfur.

Returns have steadily elevated since 2025, reaching about 5.1 million by August 2026. Khartoum has seen a significant return of displaced individuals, with about 2.7 million returnees.

Despite the decline, thousands and thousands stay displaced greater than three years into the conflict. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) says the variety of individuals newly displaced in Kordofan since combating escalated in October 2025 has risen 65 % in 4 months, from greater than 132,000 in February to no less than 219,000 by late June.

The company has warned that el-Obeid, which shelters about 500,000 individuals, together with greater than 83,000 displaced, faces a looming risk of a full-scale invasion.

“The warning indicators are unimaginable to disregard,” said IOM Director General Amy Pope earlier this month. “Across Sudan, households are fleeing violence, dropping entry to water, electrical energy and healthcare, and now dealing with the added burden of harmful floods.”