Sudan army absorbs RSF defectors amid atrocity claims

The Sudanese army has begun formally absorbing defectors from the Rapid Support Forces into its ranks, as the arrival of more than 300 fighters led by a commander accused of abuses in El Fasher sparks calls for accountability.

The army said on Thursday that it had completed the first phase of procedures to regularise the status of fighters who had left the RSF and joined its forces.

The process included security and administrative checks and the swearing of military oaths, with the former RSF members expected to be assigned to different army formations and units.

Major General Al-Walid Abdel Qader Ajabna, head of the army's administration branch, said security and administrative procedures for the defectors had been completed, while a committee has been established to oversee their absorption.

The announcement comes amid a growing series of defections from the RSF as fighting continues across Sudan, particularly in Kordofan and Darfur.

More than 300 RSF fighters led by Brigadier General Musa Khamiseen arrived in army-controlled territory this week after travelling from North Darfur to Al-Dabbah in Northern State, where they were received by military intelligence before continuing to Omdurman.

The group reportedly arrived with dozens of armed vehicles.

Khamiseen said his forces had decided to join the army and claimed other RSF groups were preparing to follow them, arguing that continued fighting under the RSF did not serve the Sudanese people.

But the defection has provoked anger among Darfuri armed groups fighting alongside the army, with Khamiseen facing allegations that he was involved in serious abuses against civilians during the RSF's siege and eventual capture of El Fasher in October 2025.

Sudan Tribune reported that former fighters involved in the battle for the North Darfur capital have accused Khamiseen of involvement in extrajudicial executions and the killing of civilians.

Darfuri groups have called for his arrest and prosecution, arguing that defecting to the army should not provide protection from investigation for alleged war crimes.

Khamiseen has not been reported as publicly responding to the allegations.

The controversy raises wider questions over how the Sudanese army is vetting RSF members as it seeks to encourage further defections from its battlefield rival.

The army has repeatedly called on RSF fighters to surrender or change sides as part of efforts to weaken the paramilitary force, offering the prospect that those who do so could be incorporated into state security institutions.

Former senior RSF commander Al-Nour Ahmed Adam Al-Qubba, who himself defected earlier this year, welcomed Khamiseen's force to Omdurman and urged fighters remaining with the RSF in Darfur and Kordofan to abandon the paramilitary group.

The military incentive to encourage defections, however, comes amid mounting evidence of atrocities committed during the conflict and demands from victims that individual perpetrators be held responsible regardless of which side they later join.

El Fasher became the site of some of the war's gravest alleged crimes during the prolonged RSF siege and after the group's capture of the city last October.

A UN fact-finding mission said in July that mass killings, systematic abductions, rape, torture and enforced disappearances documented in El Fasher bore "markers of genocide".

Investigations have also uncovered allegations of secret detention centres, mass graves and widespread killings following the city's fall.

The RSF has been accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity throughout Sudan's conflict, while the army and allied forces have also faced allegations of serious violations.

The dispute over Khamiseen's defection therefore presents the army with an emerging dilemma as it seeks to accelerate fractures within the RSF: whether encouraging fighters to abandon the paramilitary force can be reconciled with demands to investigate those suspected of atrocities.

Sudan's war began in April 2023 following a power struggle between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known by his nickname Hemedti, with disagreement over the proposed integration of the RSF into the regular military among the issues that preceded the conflict.

More than three years later, the army is now beginning to absorb individual RSF defectors while fighting continues against the organisation they once served.