As the war in Sudan reaches the 18-month mark with no signs of abating and increasing devastation for civilians, the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General recently presented a report to the UN Security Council on recommendations for the protection of civilians in the country. This came in response to a council request issued last June, in which the Secretary-General was asked to generate recommendations on protection in consultation with Sudanese authorities and regional stakeholders.

The council’s request spurred a series of in-person and virtual consultations led by the Secretariat with government and civil society actors in the region and beyond, including youth and women’s groups, as well as all members of the Security Council. Yet after four months of consultations, the resulting report lacks the level of ambition many Sudanese civilian stakeholders and others have been calling for^[1] and puts forth few concrete recommendations.

What’s in the Secretary-General’s report, what isn’t, and where does it fall short?

A Major Focus on Diplomatic Efforts

The bulk of the Secretary-General’s report focuses on diplomatic efforts to engage the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF). This is perhaps unsurprising, given the council’s request for recommendations to “build on existing mediation and good offices mechanisms” and considering that the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs held the pen on the report. At multiple points, the report notes that an immediate ceasefire would be the most effective means to facilitate the protection of civilians. Further, the Secretary-General’s list of recommendations begins with “intensifying diplomacy towards ending the fighting.” While efforts to achieve a ceasefire between the SAF and RSF are no doubt critical to security within Sudan, relying predominantly on such efforts to facilitate the protection of Sudanese civilians falls short for several reasons.

First, efforts to mediate a political solution to the conflict at the national level have been widely unsuccessful. This includes not only the UN’s efforts through the Secretary-General’s personal envoy, but also those undertaken by the African Union (AU) and individual member states. As the Secretary-General acknowledges, the warring parties have not engaged in face-to-face talks since the last round of the Jeddah Declaration talks in the summer of 2023. More recent efforts to convene the parties in Geneva by the so-called Aligned for Advancing Lifesaving and Peace in Sudan (ALPS) Group have produced few if any results, given the SAF’s refusal to participate.

Second, even if a ceasefire were achieved at the national level, there is still an alarming amount of violence at the subnational level, prompting warnings of the risk of genocide. Thus, protection efforts need to attend to community-level dynamics that may persist beyond the conflict between the SAF and RSF and could destabilize efforts to achieve a political settlement at the national level.

To that end, one of the Secretary-General’s recommendations is to support “locally negotiated ceasefires and other de-escalation or violence-reduction measures to protect civilians.” However, while the Secretary-General notes that the UN “remains available to facilitate and support these initiatives,” he does not propose any concrete suggestions or resources to facilitate such arrangements.

Third, and relatedly, while a cessation of hostilities between the SAF and RSF would undoubtedly help the overall security situation in Sudan, it would not necessarily ameliorate all forms of violence affecting civilians, particularly in the short-term. Not only does violence often increase in the lead-up to a ceasefire, as warring parties may target civilians to improve their bargaining positions, but violence can also remain high post-agreement, particularly gender-based violence against women.

To be clear, diplomatic efforts to achieve a ceasefire between the parties are critical and should be emphasized as part of an overall strategy to ameliorate conflict in Sudan. However, such efforts lack the scope and immediacy required to be the principal strategy to protect civilians.

The Primary Responsibility of the Parties

As in any context, the primary responsibility to protect civilians in Sudan lies with the State, including the SAF as well as the RSF, and all parties have obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law (IHL/IHRL). A considerable portion of the report is spent reminding the parties of these obligations, as well as additional commitments they have made on the protection of civilians, including the Jeddah Declaration of Commitment to Protect the Civilians of Sudan. The RSF also presented unilateral commitments on protection during the Geneva talks, though these have not translated into improvements on the ground.

The Secretary-General notes that the UN “stands ready to encourage training or capacity building” to reinforce the parties’ respect for IHL/IHRL, though one could make the case that the gap in protection is due more to a lack of willingness than a lack of knowledge. Further, while the Secretary-General details the ways that the parties have not lived up to their obligations, the report does not provide much thinking on how to leverage changes in their behavior. In fairness, this is not a level of detail that one would likely expect to see in an open report. However, it will be crucial for member states, including the Security Council, to identify points of leverage that can be used to further compliance in the immediate term, even as the mediation effort to resolve the larger conflict is ongoing.

Support to Community-led Efforts

Given the intractable conflict between the SAF and RSF, the international system needs to find ways to support the immediate and sustainable protection of Sudanese civilians. The quickest and most effective way to do this in the short and the long term is to funnel resources directly to Sudanese actors on the ground who are providing protection for themselves and their communities. Local actors have demonstrated themselves to be the lifeline and, sometimes, the only source of protection, aid, and livelihood in many parts of the country. To this end, the Secretary-General’s report calls for “enhanced and flexible financial and technical support to Sudanese civil society organizations and networks,” as well as technical and financial support for community-based initiatives and local early warning systems.

However, significant bureaucratic and policy obstacles persist that hinder UN agencies and major funders from providing flexible, direct funding to local and grassroots actors in Sudan. While the Secretary-General acknowledges the vital role these local organizations play in safeguarding the protection of civilians and shaping Sudan’s future, there is a notable lack of concrete recommendations for addressing internal policies that would enable UN agencies and programs to facilitate more accessible and direct funding channels.

Not everywhere in Sudan is inaccessible, but even in the areas which are accessible, the international response to local actors is under-resourced. Intensive support to community-led efforts requires a combination of UN and bilateral donors to streamline their bureaucratic requirements, quickly and creatively incentivize local responders with smaller grants, and work in new ways through electronic cash transfers and other local means to provide direct financial support.

Also key to supporting civilian safety is addressing the communications blackout, which is a major impediment to locally led protection efforts. The Secretary-General, his personal envoy, and member states must work collectively to identify political pressure points to ameliorate this issue.

Monitoring and Reporting Mechanisms

One measure that has been repeatedly called for, including by Sudanese stakeholders, is additional monitoring and reporting. An Independent International Fact Finding Mission (FFM) has already been deployed by the Human Rights Council to investigate alleged abuses of IHL/IHRL as part of the conflict between the SAF and the RSF. The Secretary-General refers to the FFM in his report, as well as the forthcoming AU-led mechanism, and mentions the need for member states to ensure this mission unfettered access, financing, and cooperation to carry out their mandates. However, despite his references to the importance of the FFM, the Secretary-General has not adopted the FFM’s recommendation to urgently deploy a physical presence based on the gravity of the threat to civilians (discussed further below).

Additionally, the Secretary-General recommends the establishment of a “robust and transparent compliance mechanism” to ensure that the parties are adhering to their obligations and commitments to protect civilians. This was also previously proposed by the ALPS Group in Geneva and is an important tool to help hold warring parties accountable for their behavior, particularly given the telecommunications blackout that has been in effect in Sudan since last February. It may also represent one of the more viable options, given that the mechanism would hold parties accountable for their own previous commitments within the Jeddah Declaration, the only political document agreed to by both parties.

The Role of the African Union in Sudan

The report also references the role played by the AU. However, the lack of follow-through on key decisions by the African Union (AU)  has hindered its ability to advance civilian protection in Sudan. In 2024, the the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) convened about six sessions on Sudan, which, among other things, proposed the convening of an extraordinary summit on the conflict and mandated its newly operationalized sub-committee on sanctions to identify and target external actors providing support to the warring parties. Notably, the PSC has emphasized the urgent need for measures to protect civilians and has requested investigations into atrocities and human rights violations by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. However, the implementation of these decisions is still pending.

While the PSC awaits the investigation and proposals it requested in May to address the atrocities committed in El-Fasher and other parts of Darfur,  as well as recommendations on civilian protection, a renewed wave of violence and atrocities is currently being committed in Gezira state; last week, the RSF killed more than 120 people.  It is apparent that the AU has not met the escalating violations and the evolving protection needs with an adequate and timely response.

Overall, the situation in Sudan demands the urgent implementation of all decisions and more action from the AU. At the same time, it is important to acknowledge the significant challenges the AU is facing in navigating a complex geopolitical landscape, as its role is constrained by the non-African dimensions of the crisis. Given the lack of leverage held by the AU and UN over the warring parties and the influence of the Red Sea and Gulf countries with economic and security interests in Sudan, the prospects for changing the behavior of the warring parties, as proposed by the Secretary-General, appear very limited.

The UN Security Council Dynamics

Given the challenges, there is much more that could be done at the diplomatic level. Civilian protection and the provision of humanitarian aid in Sudan have been instrumentalized by external actors and domestic authorities to advance their respective agendas. Geopolitical rivalries have significantly impacted the delivery of humanitarian aid, with allegations of mercenaries and weapons entering Sudan under the guise of humanitarian assistance, as noted by the representative of Sudan at the Security Council briefing on October 28^th. On a separate occasion, the Sudanese Finance Minister’s call for the deployment of internationally protected teams at the Chad-Sudan border, while paradoxical given the authorities’ resistance to protection measures in Sudan, highlights the complex interplay of domestic and external factors influencing the responses to the threats against civilians.

Since Sudan receives less attention from the Security Council compared to other global crises, the council’s three African members (A3) must elevate their engagement by building on the PSC’s recent decisions. Algeria, speaking at the October 28^th briefing on behalf of the A3+1 (the A3 plus the council member from the Caribbean), emphasized the need for synergy between global and regional efforts, prioritizing the roles of the AU and UN. The statement also underscored the importance of linking civilian protection with accountability mechanisms. The international fact-finding mission’s findings illustrate the significant threat posed by impunity and the imperative of aligning protection efforts with accountability measures. These provisions can be taken forward including by working closely with the penholder, the United Kingdom (UK), during its presidency in November to bring much-needed attention and elevate the level of ambition around civilian protection in Sudan.

An option being considered by some Security Council members is the possible application of resolution 2719 on UN financing for AU-led peace support operations to deploy a regional mechanism. In the absence of a national ceasefire agreement, the council could consider establishing a compliance framework for the Jeddah declaration through an AU-led mechanism or supporting local ceasefires. Notably, the Secretary-General’s report only speaks to the limitations of deploying a UN force to protect civilians. This does not preclude the potential deployment of non-UN protection mechanisms. To this end, it is essential for the AU Commission to submit the requested recommendations on civilian protection to the PSC for deliberation. As it stands, the policy discourse on protection remains incomplete without the assessment and recommendations of the AU. If there is ever a willingness to trigger Resolution 2719, this assessment would be the starting point.

What of a Physical Deployment?

Among protection actors within and outside Sudan, perhaps the biggest question has been whether some type of regional or international force might be considered. Many Sudanese stakeholders have called for a physical deployment to provide targeted protection and facilitate the delivery of much-needed aid. However, this option is not included among the Secretary-General’s recommendations. Instead, he relegates it to the conclusion of the report, where he casts it off by stating that the conditions do not exist for the successful deployment of a UN mission.

No one would argue that the Sudan context poses tremendous political and operational hurdles, many of which could make it difficult to deploy a mission. However, numerous actors—including Sudanese stakeholders—have put forward creative suggestions for establishing targeted areas of physical protection, facilitating access to aid, and strengthening local protection networks. In this way, the report is not only dismissive of Sudanese stakeholders, but it also demonstrates a lack of ambition and creativity that the Secretary-General himself called for in the New Agenda for Peace, in which he advocates for the more creative use of collective security tools and missions that are more “versatile, nimble and adaptable.”

Now What?

The situation is now in the hands of the Security Council, and the Secretary-General’s recommendations should serve as a starting point for more ambitious action by Council members. As noted above, much now rests on the UK, which holds the pen on the file, and which could use its council presidency this November to promote the protection of civilians and advance more creative action in Sudan. However, if the statements made during the council briefing are indicative of the potential for action, it appears that the recommendations from the report may serve as a ceiling rather than a floor. While there was some hope that the New Agenda for Peace and the Pact would facilitate more ambitious and creative solutions to peace and security crises, the Sudan case unfortunately highlights the UN’s continued inability to address the world’s most pressing contexts, offering little hope for Sudanese or others who may look to the organization for help.

^{[1]Based on a series of consultations that the International Peace Institute has undertaken in partnership with other civil society organizations in the region and globally.}

Jenna Russo is the Director of Research and Head of the Brian Urquhart Center for Peace Operations at the International Peace Institute (IPI). Bitania Tadesse is the Policy Specialist for Africa at IPI.