section_path: Course of the war/October–December 2023/SAF collapse in Darfur
section_name: SAF collapse in Darfur
paragraph_text: SAF collapse in Darfur
  
  By October 2023, the SAF in Darfur was experiencing acute shortages in supplies due to RSF-imposed sieges and had failed to utilize its air superiority to stem RSF advances. On 26 October, the RSF captured Nyala, Sudan's fourth-largest city, after seizing control of the SAF's 16th Infantry Division headquarters. The fall of Nyala, a strategic city with an international airport and border connections to Central Africa, allowed the RSF to receive international supplies more easily and concentrate its forces on other Sudanese cities. After Nyala's fall, RSF fighters turned their focus to Zalingei, the capital of Central Darfur. The SAF's 21st Infantry Division, stationed in Zalingei, fled the city without a fight and allowed the RSF to take it over.
  
  In Geneina, reports emerged that tribal elders were attempting to broker the surrender of the SAF garrison in the city to prevent bloodshed. The army rejected the proposal, raising fears of an imminent RSF assault on the city and causing civilians to flee across the border into Chad. The RSF besieged the headquarters of the SAF's 15th Infantry Division in Geneina, giving the garrison a six-hour ultimatum to surrender. The base was captured two days later when the 15th withdrew from the area before fleeing to Chad. Those left behind, numbering in the hundreds, were taken prisoner and paraded in RSF media with signs of abuse. Witnesses later reported mass atrocities perpetrated by the RSF in the city shortly after its seizure, with a local rebel group claiming up to 2,000 people were massacred in Geneina's satellite town of Ardamata. With Geneina's fall, Ed Daein and Al-Fashir were the last remaining capitals in Darfur under government control, with both cities under heavy RSF pressure.
  
  The RSF stormed and plundered the town of Umm Keddada, east of Al-Fashir, after the SAF garrison withdrew. SAF troops in Al-Fashir itself were reported to be running low on food, water, and medicine due to the city being under siege, and external forces noted the SAF seemed incapable of stopping the RSF advance. Ed Daein fell in the early hours of 21 November, with RSF forces taking control of the city after seizing the headquarters of the SAF's 20th Infantry Division. SAF garrisons in East Darfur subsequently abandoned their positions and withdrew, allowing the RSF to occupy the area. In response to RSF gains in Darfur and subsequent abuses, the Justice and Equality Movement, Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (Minnawi), and other smaller rebel factions renounced their neutrality and declared war on the RSF.