A medical organization has accused a Sudanese rebel group allied with the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary of killing 27 people, including four children, in South Kordofan province.
In a statement on Tuesday, the Sudan Doctors Network said the killings were carried out by the Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) in Qardud and Abu Hamama, areas inhabited by the Otoro tribe in South Kordofan.
“The attacks have caused a large wave of displacement of people towards the Abu Hitan and Kadugli areas,” the statement said.
The organization also stressed that targeting unarmed civilians on an ethnic basis is a “clear violation of international humanitarian law,” while warning that continued violations could push “the conflict in South Kordofan into a broader ethnic conflict.”
The killings follow intense fighting earlier this year between forces linked to the SPLM-N and the Otoro tribe, a minority group in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan.
The ethnic confrontation, rooted in land disputes, adds further complexity to the ongoing civil war in Sudan, which erupted in April 2023 between the Sudanese army and the RSF.
The Sudan Doctors Network called on the international community to pressure SPLM-N leaders to stop attacks on civilians, adding that women were also among those injured in recent attacks.
The SPLM-N is a breakaway faction of the SPLM, the ruling party of neighboring South Sudan.
Leader Abdel Aziz al-Hilu has allied his fighters with the RSF and joined the parallel administration led by the RSF in Sudan.
Sudan's civil war has killed at least 59,000 people and displaced about 14 million. According to the World Health Organization, some 33.7 million people, two-thirds of Sudan's population, need humanitarian assistance.
