Nyala hospital receives 36 bodies after market and neighbourhood strikes

The clearest medical record so far is from Nyala Teaching Hospital: 36 bodies received and more than 150 wounded patients seen in its emergency room. Doctors Without Borders, known as MSF, reported those figures on October 27 after the two attacks the previous evening. They are hospital intake figures—not a final death toll, and not an established market-only count.⁠15

Patients arrived with shrapnel injuries, severe burns and blood on their faces. Medical staff worked around the clock, treating women and children among the wounded. Dale Koninckx, MSF’s project coordinator in Nyala, described colleagues as deeply shaken.⁠5

The attacks struck a city controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF. Nyala is South Darfur’s capital and the administrative centre of Tasis, the RSF-aligned parallel government, also rendered Tasees. Sudan’s army and the RSF have fought since April 2023. That political and military geography explains the competing accounts of the attack; it does not establish the status of everyone caught in it.⁠7⁠11

A cigarette vendor interviewed by The Associated Press on Wednesday said hundreds of RSF fighters had gathered at the market that evening. He moved his stall between their groups to sell cigarettes. At around 8 p.m., he said, a drone struck, killing dozens of fighters and women selling food. He withheld his name because he feared reprisals.⁠11

A second witness, also speaking anonymously for fear of reprisals, described a massive explosion and many fighters killed. He estimated around 14 civilian deaths, mostly women selling tea and food. Neither account supplies a verified casualty breakdown. But both describe civilians working alongside gatherings of armed men, not a site occupied only by combatants.⁠11

The second witness explained why sellers went there: widespread unemployment left few other sources of income, so civilians gathered wherever fighters congregated. South Darfur’s civilian administration likewise described women selling falafel, snacks and tea among those affected. Selling food to fighters does not make the sellers fighters. Economic dependence on armed customers is not evidence of combatant status.⁠11⁠4

MSF explicitly blamed the Sudanese Armed Forces for the drone strikes. RSF-aligned authorities and rights-group accounts also attributed the attack to the army. Didan’s statement adds evidence from the army-allied side, but the aircraft’s identity has not been independently established, and no direct army response is available in the reporting examined. The presence of fighters does not, by itself, settle whether the attack complied with obligations to protect civilians.⁠15⁠7⁠11

The location descriptions also remain imperfect. Al Jazeera’s October 27 AFP account placed the market in northern Nyala. MSF’s later statement placed it in the west; Radio Tamazuj named Tanqong Market in the western Dumaya neighbourhood. Dabanga used Dumaya market and, in its account of a ministry announcement, Tangong market. The north–west difference remains unreconciled, and the reporting does not establish that every label is interchangeable. The better-supported timing is Monday, October 26, at approximately 8 p.m. local time, or 18:00 GMT—not October 27, when the initial report appeared.⁠1⁠15⁠7⁠4

An initial medic’s account, carried by Al Jazeera on October 27, gave at least 21 dead and more than 40 injured. MSF’s subsequent hospital statement substantially enlarged that account. It also recorded that 21 of the 36 bodies received were wearing civilian clothing. Those two uses of 21 measure different things: an early death count and a later clothing observation. Clothing alone cannot establish legal civilian status, nor can the other 15 bodies simply be classified as fighters.⁠1⁠15

The much higher claims have not been reconciled with the hospital record. Health minister Alaa al-Din Nugud of the RSF-aligned Tasis government told Radio Tamazuj on October 27 that 102 civilians had been killed and 113 people injured. By Tuesday afternoon, his ministry was claiming 188 dead and 356 injured, according to Dabanga’s October 28 report. The ministry said its later figures came from health institutions and medical teams and could change. That was a revision of its own account, not an independently confirmed new total.⁠7⁠4

Emergency Lawyers, a rights group tracking violence, separately claimed more than 100 deaths and 113 injuries, with many women and children among the victims. Darfur Victims Organization director Adam Musa Obama told Radio Tamazuj that his group had documented 14 civilian deaths and relayed witness accounts of 120 people killed or wounded. These figures cannot be added: their geographic scope, coverage of the two strikes and overlap have not been explained.⁠11⁠7

The Sudan Doctors Network still gave at least 21 dead and more than 40 wounded on Wednesday. It explained that military operations, security restrictions and difficulty reaching documentation sources had delayed verification. It also described shelling, unlike the drone accounts from MSF and witnesses. Its lower count does not reverse the hospital’s intake; its statement underscores how incomplete the casualty documentation remains. AP said it could not independently verify the casualty figures.⁠11

Some losses have names attached, though confirmation remains limited. The Sudan Liberation Movement led by Abdel Wahid El Nur announced that five relatives of one of its members had died: Iman Mohammed Abulgasim, Fatima Ismail, Sara Yacoub, Hassan Abdel Moneim and Mawahib Ali. Their deaths await confirmation beyond that announcement. They are not a complete victim list.⁠4

This was Nyala’s second market attack within ten days. On October 16, a drone struck Al-Mawashi livestock market, killing at least four people and injuring others. Those casualties belong to that earlier attack. Repeated strikes endanger sellers and shoppers while threatening access to food and supplies in a city already under nutritional pressure.⁠15

AP, citing UN figures, reported that a treatment-related measure involving children with severe acute malnutrition in Nyala rose from 5 percent in January to 11 percent in August. The available account does not specify the denominator, so those percentages cannot be read as malnutrition prevalence among all the city’s children. They nevertheless describe strain preceding this attack—not damage caused by it.⁠11

The threat to civilian infrastructure extends beyond Nyala. Al Jazeera reported RSF strikes on six power stations on Monday that cut electricity to millions across Gezira, White Nile, Sennar and Gadarif, followed by a Tuesday transformer-station attack disrupting parts of Khartoum and Gezira. Neither side’s attacks excuse the other’s.⁠1

South Darfur’s civilian administration has called for an urgent international investigation. Meanwhile, aid worker Mubarak Bekheit told AP on Wednesday that people remained missing and bodies had yet to be recovered from homes. A final toll requires finding those people and identifying the dead—not choosing the largest claim, or the smallest. For families still searching, the count remains unfinished work.⁠4⁠11