SUDANESE paramilitaries on Sunday struck Port Sudan, the army said, in the first attack on the seat of the army-aligned government during the country’s two-year war.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF), battling the regular army since April 2023, have increasingly used drones since losing territory including much of Khartoum in March.
Army spokesman Nabil Abdallah said in a statement the RSF “targeted Osman Digna Air Base, a goods warehouse and some civilian facilities in the city of Port Sudan with suicide drones”.
He reported no casualties and “limited damage”.
Red Sea Military Region Commander Mahjoub Bushra told Sudan’s news agency SUNA the assault lasted three and a half hours and involved 11 drones.
AFP images showed smoke above the airport area, about 650 kilometres (400 miles) from the nearest known RSF positions on Khartoum’s outskirts.
Later Sunday, an AFP correspondent reported anti-aircraft fire intercepting another drone headed for an air base west of the Red Sea coastal city.
Sudanese men ride on a motorcycle past destroyed military vehicles in front of a hospital in Khartoum on April 28, 2025. (Photo by AFP)
In the eastern border town of Kassala near Eritrea, some 500 kilometres south of Port Sudan, witnesses said three drones hit the airport a day after another drone targeted the same site for the first time.
Farther south in North Kordofan capital of El-Obeid, residents also reported drones overhead, followed by explosions and plumes of smoke.
In February, the army broke a nearly two-year paramilitary siege of El-Obeid, a key link to the vast western Darfur region which is under near-total RSF control.
At dawn Sunday, an AFP correspondent in Port Sudan said his home about 20 kilometres from the airport shook as explosions were heard.
The airport, a critical hub since the war began, closed temporarily but resumed operations at 5:00 pm (1500 GMT), a Civil Aviation Authority statement said.