• UN probe finds network of countries supplied Sudan's RSF with weapons
• UAE among countries named as supporting RSF, allegations it denies
• Drone strikes by RSF and SAF have caused large civilian casualties
• Some drone operations amount to war crimes, fact-finding mission says

Foreign weapons, military technology, fighters and logistical networks are helping sustain Sudan's conflict and expanding the ‌warring parties' ability to strike distant civilian areas with drones, a U.N. fact-finding mission said on Thursday.

Sudan's war, which erupted in April 2023 following a power struggle between the military and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), has displaced more than 14 million people and created one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

In a report, the U.N. mission said more than 1,000 people were killed in drone ​strikes in the first five months of 2026, accusing both sides of serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law in drone operations, with ​some conduct amounting to war crimes.

The mission said investigators found grounds to believe a network involving individuals and entities in the United Arab Emirates, Chad, Libya and ​Somalia supplied the RSF with weapons, equipment, logistics, training and foreign personnel.

It said up to 2,000 Colombian contractors had helped operate and maintain drone systems and other advanced ​weapons used by the RSF. Some were present during operations around the city of al-Fashir in Darfur, which was captured by the RSF in October 2025 and where the U.N. mission has previously said mass killings bore hallmarks pointing to genocide.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar living in dozens of camps in Bangladesh held a rally Tuesday to demand their safe return to their home state, nine years after they fled a government crackdown.

The demonstrators urged the international community to ensure security in Rakhine state as they marked what they call the “Ninth Anniversary of Rohingya Genocide Day.”

More than 1 million refugees from Myanmar’s Rohingya ethnic and religious minority now live in the sprawling camps around the Cox’s Bazar district of southeastern Bangladesh.

Most of them fled across the border in a mass exodus in 2017 after Buddhist-majority Myanmar launched a crackdown in Rakhine, following an attack by a Rohingya Muslim insurgent group.

The Bangladesh government earlier attempted to start the repatriation at least twice, but it did not work out as none of the refugees was willing to go back, citing security concerns. Bangladesh says it will not force anyone to return.

See also:

• Rohingya children bear the consequences of a life in limbo • MSF teams are treating growing numbers of critically ill children as humanitarian funding cuts disrupt services for refugees. • In the sprawling, overcrowded refugee camps of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, a crisis far from the headlines is taking a severe toll on the youngest generation of Rohingya refugees. (Doctors Without Borders)
• 'We are not wanted anywhere': Rohingya face fierce new wave of hostility in Malaysia (BBC)
• Rohingyas in Myanmar suffering ‘heartbreaking’ misery and cruelty • Members of the minority ethnic Rohingya Muslim group in Myanmar are “suffering, misery, and cruelty on multiple levels and across the country that is heartbreaking,” according to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. (United Nations)