Since the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) captured the city of El Fasher in Sudan’s Darfur region on October 27th, there have been horrific reports of widespread atrocities, including killings in hospitals and mass burials, and satellite imagery shows the streets stained with blood. Thousands remain trapped in the city, and the UN has confirmed famine conditions. Violence is now escalating in the neighboring Kordofan region.

So far, however, the international response has not been commensurate to the scale of the atrocities. On November 14th, the Human Rights Council requested the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for the Sudan to conduct an urgent inquiry into human rights violations in and around El Fasher, including the identification of perpetrators. This is an important first step toward a formal investigation and documentation of the atrocities. But it is time for action by the Security Council. It should agree on concrete steps to respond to the atrocities in El Fasher that go beyond simply repeating past messages.

At the Security Council’s October 30th meeting in response to the RSF’s assault on El Fasher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Tom Fletcher implored the Council to take action to stop the atrocities, create “genuine pressure” to ensure full humanitarian access, provide funding, and ensure accountability. Following the meeting, the Security Council issued a statement condemning the “reported atrocities being perpetrated by the RSF” in El Fasher, demanding that all parties to the conflict protect civilians, and calling for the perpetrators to be held accountable.

However, this failed to meaningfully influence the conflict parties. The Council did not address key aspects of Fletcher’s call for action. A Security Council statement does not provide relief to those immediately suffering and in need of protection and humanitarian assistance. Nonetheless, a statement can be meaningful if it acts as a deterrent to the conflict parties and their external supporters by raising the reputational consequences of their actions. The Council should therefore follow up its initial statement with an escalated call to end external support to the conflict and specify that the conflict parties will be judged by their actions in areas like unblocking humanitarian access, not just verbal commitments.

One of the barriers to action by the Security Council has been internal divisions that have inhibited the Council’s strong stances against and influence over either the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) or external backers of the RSF. In November 2024, Russia vetoed a draft resolution by the United Kingdom and Sierra Leone on the protection of civilians. The resolution would not have authorized the deployment of a protection force, as the International Fact-Finding Mission for the Sudan has previously recommended, but it would have requested the Secretary-General to develop a proposal for a mechanism to ensure the parties’ compliance with their previous commitments. In casting its veto, Russia criticized the draft resolution for proposing “external mechanisms” that bypass the government of Sudan (i.e., the SAF). This message corresponds with SAF’s critiques of the UN, as reflected in its decision to expel the World Food Programme’s country director in late October over unspecified “interference in internal affairs.” In light of its divisions, the Security Council has generally agreed to issue verbal condemnations of the RSF, including in Resolution 2736 (April 2024), which demanded that the group halt its siege of El Fasher, but not of the SAF. Yet as the International Crisis Group recently detailed, diplomatic pressure is needed on both the RSF and the SAF to achieve a truce.

The Security Council’s statements have also failed to identify specific external backers of the conflict. Many observers have criticized the US and UK for failing to take action against the external arming of the RSF, particularly by the United Arab Emirates (UAE). When asked about the role of the UAE on November 12th, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio made a stronger call for cutting off weapons and support to the RSF than he had in the past, but he did not mention specific backers. This ambiguity is reflected in Security Council statements that have not condemned external backers by name. Doing so would raise the reputational costs of continuing to fuel the violence.

Beyond issuing a stronger statement, the Security Council should at a minimum ensure robust monitoring of the arms embargo already in place as a step toward accountability. The Security Council has maintained an arms embargo on Darfur since 2004, which it unanimously renewed in September, establishing binding obligations against the transfer of weapons to Darfur. Yet this embargo continues to be violated, with the RSF reportedly obtaining weapons through resilient transnational supply routes. The SAF’s offensive military overflights and indiscriminate air strikes in Darfur also violate Security Council Resolution 1591 (2005), which prohibits offensive flights over the region. The A3+ members of the Security Council (Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone, and Somalia) have directly linked the violations of the arms embargo to the facilitation of ethnic-based massacres and large-scale sexual violence in El Fasher.

Action by the UN Security Council should be joined with strong action from the African Union Peace and Security Council (PSC). The PSC held an emergency meeting on the situation in El Fasher on October 28th, two days before the Security Council meeting, and issued a communiqué requesting Adama Dieng—the AU’s special envoy on the prevention of genocide—to conduct a fact-finding mission in Sudan and report on his recommendations within three weeks (by November 18th). The PSC additionally directed its Subcommittee on Sanctions to recommend measures in response to external support to the warring factions in the same timeframe. The PSC made the same call in its June 2024 communiqué. However, there is no public information on AU action on sanctions in response to the atrocities in Sudan.

Considering the atrocities committed in El Fasher, more action is needed by member states, the UN, and the AU to protect civilians, as detailed in a recent IPI report. Some actions, such as the deployment of a protection force, should be considered in the long term, though the success of such a force would depend on many factors, including regional buy-in. Yet a range of immediate actions are also available. For example, member states could convene an Arria-formula meeting and other informal discussions through the Security Council, adopt a normative resolution on the protection of civilians through the General Assembly, and establish a contact group. The UN and AU could pursue joint action, including through closer coordination between their respective offices on genocide prevention. Further, a recent report by the NGO Preventing and Ending Mass Atrocities outlines steps for a coordinated monitoring and reporting mechanism for civilian protection.

It remains to be seen whether the Security Council and AU PSC will take the next steps needed—individually or jointly. Most immediately, deliberations will be needed to decide how to act on the recommendations of Adama Dieng and the PSC Subcommittee on Sanctions, though both appear to be delayed. To mitigate further delays and the risk of next steps being minimal or symbolic, the Security Council should deliver a message that it looks forward to robust outcomes from Dieng’s visit and signal its openness to subsequent actions and collaboration.

The Security Council’s press statement condemning the summary executions in El Fasher did not convey a substantively new message or plan of action. The Council should strengthen its previous condemnations of the RSF’s actions to demonstrate political costs commensurate with the atrocities in El Fasher while also signaling to the SAF the consequence of its continued violations of the Council’s calls for civilian protection and humanitarian access. The Council should also specify deadlines for its next steps, such as reviewing monthly updates regarding the conflict parties’ violence against civilians and credible steps toward a truce. Strengthened condemnation and attention from the Council could send a signal to those fueling the conflict that there is growing momentum in New York to press for ending the violence and that the response to the atrocities in El Fasher cannot be simply business as usual. The Security Council’s continued gridlock on Sudan is not inevitable.