At least 40 people have been killed in a drone strike by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in North Kordofan in central Sudan, a local official said.
The humanitarian affairs commissioner in North Kordofan, whose name was not given, told Al Jazeera on Monday that the fatalities occurred in the strike that targeted civilians in the village of Al Luweib, east of the provincial capital El Obeid.
The state government earlier said that dozens of civilians were killed and wounded, including children and women, in the attack that targeted a funeral tent in the village.
It described the attack as “a new crime added to the RSF’s repeated atrocities against civilians”, saying several women, children and elderly people were among the victims, without giving an exact figure.
The state government appealed to the international community to immediately classify the RSF as a “terrorist organisation”, accusing it of “committing ethnically and racially motivated crimes against unarmed civilians”.
The attack came shortly after the RSF said it would launch an attack on El Obeid soon, “urging residents to leave the city” through what it called safe corridors.