Reuters Exposes Child Kidnapping & Enslavement by UAE-linked RSF

Witness accounts compiled by Reuters point to a systematic pattern of child abduction following Rapid Support Forces’ (RSF) military campaign in Darfur, particularly during the 18-month siege and late-October 2024 takeover of al-Fashir. Rather than isolated abuses, the incidents suggest the use of terror, forced labor, and family destruction as tools of control in contested territory.

More than two dozen witnesses described 23 separate incidents in which at least 56 children, ranging in age from two months to 17 years, were taken during attacks dating back to 2023. Six said their own relatives were abducted. Reuters said it could not independently verify the accounts or determine the total number of children seized.

RSF militants have been at war with Sudan’s army since April 2023 over control of a state with significant mineral reserves, arable land, and Red Sea ports. Human rights organizations have accused both sides of violations, including the recruitment of child soldiers. However, Reuters noted that abduction and enslavement of children by the RSF and allied militias had not previously been documented in this form by other media.

Child Enslavement

Sheldon Yett, head of UNICEF in Sudan, said he had not received reports of children being kidnapped specifically for slavery or livestock herding, but added that the testimonies gathered by Reuters “are sadly consistent with the broader pattern of grave violations we continue to see against children.”

Three legal experts told Reuters the alleged acts could constitute unlawful imprisonment, torture, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Patricia Sellers, a former special adviser on slavery crimes at the International Criminal Court (ICC), said the accounts may amount to enslavement and slave trading under international law.

UN human rights officials have issued repeated warnings as RSF operations expanded. On Oct 31, 2025, the UN said it was receiving “horrendous accounts of summary executions, mass killings, rapes, attacks against humanitarian workers & other atrocities committed during & after the fall of El Fasher to the RSF,” calling for independent investigations and accountability.

Also on Dec 18, 2025, UN Human Rights said a report into the RSF takeover of Zamzam internally displaced persons (IDP) camp in April found that over 1,000 civilians were deliberately killed, potentially constituting the war crime of murder.

Janjaweed Legacy and Racialized Violence

The RSF evolved from the Janjaweed militias accused of genocide in Darfur in the early 2000s. During that conflict, activists documented child abductions for domestic labor, livestock herding, and sexual slavery. Sudan’s army told Reuters that the current allegations were “consistent with those of the Janjaweed militia during the previous regime.”

Reporting on gruesome RSF killings, Amnesty International said last November that civilians in Sudan were facing “unimaginable horror” amid escalating ethnically motivated violence in Darfur, where the RSF and allied Arab militias have killed and injured hundreds of civilians, most of them men and older boys from the Masalit community.

Several witnesses said RSF militants referred to abducted children as “falungiat,” a derogatory term implying house slaves and used against communities perceived as aligned with the army. Many of the witnesses were from the Zaghawa tribe and said racial slurs were used during attacks.

Witnesses described abductions in al-Fashir itself and along the 50 km route west to Tawila, where the UN estimates about 665,000 displaced people are sheltering. Madina Adam Khamis, 38, said RSF fighters killed captives at al-Fashir University on Oct 26, including a woman seven months pregnant and 10 children, before taking five young children and a two-month-old baby in a Toyota Land Cruiser. Reuters said it could not corroborate her account.

Forced Labor, Ransom, and Recruitment

Multiple witnesses said fighters told families the children would be used to look after livestock, a common task for minors in rural Darfur. Amnesty International reported last month on one child abducted near Zamzam camp who was chained at night, forced to herd sheep for more than six weeks, and released only after a ransom of five million Sudanese pounds, about $1,500, was paid. Reuters said it had not independently verified Amnesty’s findings.

The Sudan Doctors Network said on Nov 25, 2025: “More than 150 young men and underage children were forcibly abducted for the purpose of recruitment” in a direct assault on civilians that amounts to war crimes and grave violations of international humanitarian law.

Alleged Layered Mercenary System

Analysts have noted the RSF sustains combat power through a layered mercenary system, including cross-border recruitment and foreign specialists, reinforcing its ability to hold territory despite international condemnation.

UAE-linked RSF routinely denies deliberately targeting civilians and says it investigates allegations of abuse by its fighters, including claimes corroborated by International Criminal Court and United Nations officials.