Hassan Koko sits on a homemade wooden bed, looking over the hills of the Nuba Mountains in South Kordofan, Sudan. Despite the view and a cool late-afternoon breeze, he is visibly unsettled.
On November 29, the 50-year-old community health worker had just finished a training and was drinking sweet tea when a drone arrived and struck. Several of his colleagues were killed. “The drone struck once, then came back again, hitting those who were already wounded,” he tells DW.
Koko survived but was badly hurt. He points to his left knee, where a sharp metal fragment remains three months after the attack. “My family was happy I survived. They thought I would die,” he says. “But life is not the same anymore. Sometimes, I walk down to the nearby market, but mostly, I’m just stuck at home.”
A shifting alliance
For decades the Nuba Mountains, controlled by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N), have endured attacks from Sudan’s Armed Forces (SAF). The current conflict traces back to 2011, when the area was excluded from the settlement that led to South Sudan’s independence, deepening long-standing grievances among the region’s more than 50 ethnic groups.
The SPLM-N, born from the SPLA liberation movement, formed in 2011 to press for Nuba self-rule. A notable shift came in February 2025, when the SPLM-N allied with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The alignment was widely seen as precarious and controversial.
The wider Sudan war, which began in 2023, has produced what many describe as the world’s most severe humanitarian crisis: estimates suggest more than 150,000 dead and about 14 million people displaced. Jalale Getachew Birru, a senior analyst at the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) project, says the SPLM-N–RSF tie should be viewed pragmatically. “Both sides have a common interest, and that’s why they are aligned at this moment, to push back against the SAF,” she says, noting both groups’ shared desire for a federal future in Sudan.
Overwhelmed by war refugees
In the Nuba Mountains’ towns, RSF soldiers move freely—chatting in cafés, lingering in busy markets and selling looted goods ranging from cars and beds to fuel and electronics. But soldiers are not the only newcomers.
At the SPLM-N headquarters in Kauda, Jalal Abdulkarim coordinates humanitarian aid for refugees in so-called liberated areas. He slides a yellow slip of paper across his desk: 2,885,393, the number of refugees the SPLM-N says it has received since the war began.
Humanitarian programming in the area depends heavily on external NGOs and UN agencies, Abdulkarim says, but funding is strained. He blames cuts following Donald Trump’s dismantling of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) last year, leaving donations far smaller than before. “If an NGO previously donated $1 or $2 million, today it’s just $500,000 or $200,000. This is one of the biggest challenges we face,” he says.
The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) estimates Kordofan hosts “more than a million” internally displaced persons. With little apparent UN presence in the state capital Kadugli and many international NGOs suspending or scaling back operations, accurate counts are difficult.
Temporary shelter in the Nuba Mountains
Deeper in the mountains, the Umm Dulo Reception Camp is a stark plain where displaced families have erected shelters of sticks and plastic beneath acacia trees. Zone 12, at the camp’s far end, houses the newest arrivals. Fatma Eisa Kuku, 76, remembers the life she fled in Kadugli. “I couldn’t sleep. Every night was rat-tat-tat-tat,” she says, mimicking gunfire.
Kuku now sleeps again in Umm Dulo but cannot forget the abduction of three men she calls brothers. “They came between dawn and dusk, and I haven’t seen my brothers since,” she says. “I don’t know who these people were. If you ask about their identities, you’ll be faced with a lot of rudeness.”
New guests kept at arm’s length
Tension runs beneath the surface of the Nuba communities. The RSF rarely integrates with locals; their presence—particularly near hospitals and markets—turns crowded areas into potential targets. That risk compounds years of inherited anxiety.
Little is publicly known about the SPLM-N–RSF military agreement, but credible reports suggest the RSF has set up training camps inside SPLM-N territory, Jalale Getachew Birru says. She also doubts the alliance’s durability. When the SAF broke the siege of Kadugli earlier in the year—a place long controlled by SPLM-N and RSF—the allies blamed each other for the loss, sparking clashes observers watched for signs the partnership might end. For now, however, the alliance remains intact.
“I want to live here forever”
At the Mother of Mercy Hospital, the largest medical facility in SPLM-N-controlled areas around Gidel, three wounded RSF soldiers have moved beds into the shade to escape the heat. The RSF has been accused in horrific reports of systematic killings and other atrocities, and its fighters are often described as among the most ruthless militias of the conflict.
Asked what they are fighting for, some RSF soldiers point to basic services. “We are fighting because the government [in Sudan] is not doing enough. There are not enough hospitals, infrastructure and schools,” says Hassan Hamid, an injured RSF fighter recovering at the hospital.
For now, Hamid and others have found refuge in the Nuba Mountains, and there is little sign they intend to leave. “I want to stay here,” he says. “I want to live in the Nuba Mountains forever.”
Edited by: Benita van Eyssen