In early May, a loud explosion rocked Shambat, a neighborhood to the north of Sudan's capital of Khartoum. Locals rushed to douse the flames devouring a makeshift dwelling that they say was ignited in an air strike.
They were too late. Amid the smoldering debris, according to five witnesses, were the charred bodies of a pregnant woman, a man and five children. Following the May 7 attack, the woman and children were buried at the site and the man at a nearby cemetery, two of the witnesses said.
But across Khartoum State, which includes the capital and its sister cities Omdurman and Bahri, activist and volunteer groups have recorded at least 580 civilian deaths through July 26 as a result of air strikes, artillery and gunfire. Representatives for the army and RSF did not respond to requests for comment, including on the civilian death toll and the May 7 attack.
Even the unofficial Reuters tally is likely an undercount, because some local groups are more organized and better able to record incidents than others, said Salah Albashir, a member of an emergency response volunteer group in the city of Bahri, in which the Shambat neigborhood sits. The seven deaths in the Shambat attack are an example of the undercounting. The May 7 incident hasn’t been previously reported.
“You put it out thinking it’s wood and it turns out to be a person. You realize their skin is falling off,” said one of the people at the scene, an engineer in his thirties who, like the other witnesses, spoke on condition of anonymity due to fear of reprisals from the warring parties.Fatal attacks in residential areas have become commonplace since the fighting erupted, according to local activist committees and emergency response volunteer groups.
With air strikes and artillery shelling unrelenting, civilians are dying almost daily across the wider capital as a direct result of the conflict, according to the activist and volunteer groups. For those who have remained in areas like Shambat, life has become hellish, dozens of residents have told Reuters.
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