KHARTOUM: The Sudanese army said on Monday it had broken a long-running siege of Dilling in South Kordofan, where paramilitary forces had choked off access for more than a year and a half.

Since April 2023, Sudan has been engulfed in a conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) that has killed tens of thousands of people.

The war has also uprooted some 11 million people and triggered what the UN describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis.

In its statement, the army said its forces “succeeded in opening the Dilling road after carrying out a successful military operation”, claiming they had inflicted “heavy losses” on the RSF.

The army’s advance has secured its hold over both the northern and southern approaches to Dilling.

The push around Dilling comes as the army attempts to stem a sweeping paramilitary advance across the wider Kordofan region.

Backed by the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement and led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, the RSF shifted its focus eastward after seizing the army’s last stronghold in western Darfur last October.

Since then, the paramilitary group has tightened its grip on West Kordofan, taken Heglig home to Sudan’s largest oil field and intensified its siege of famine-hit Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan.

Atrocities surged following the RSF’s capture of El Fasher, with reports of mass killings, abductions and widespread looting. The UN has warned that similar abuses could spread into Kordofan.

More than 65,000 people have fled the Kordofan region since October, according to the latest UN figures.

A UN-backed assessment last year already confirmed famine in Kadugli, which has been under RSF siege for more than a year and a half.

The assessment said conditions in Dilling were likely similar, but security issues and a lack of access have prevented a formal declaration.

Three million return home

More than three million Sudanese people displaced by nearly three years of war have returned home, the United Nations migration agency said on Monday, even as heavy fighting continues to tear through parts of the country.

Since April 2023, Sudan has been locked in a devastating war pitting the regular army against the RSF.

The conflict has killed tens of thousands of people and created what the UN describes as the world’s largest displacement and hunger crisis. At its peak, the war had displaced around 14 million people both internally and across borders.

In a report released on Monday, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said an estimated 3.3 million displaced Sudanese had made their way back home by November of last year.

The rise in returns follows a sweeping offensive launched by the Sudanese army in late 2024 to retake central regions seized earlier in the conflict by the RSF.

The campaign culminated in the recapture of Khartoum in March 2025, prompting many displaced families to try to go back.

According to the IOM, more than three-quarters of those returning came from internal displacement sites, while 17 percent travelled back from abroad.

Khartoum saw the largest number of returns — around 1.4 million people — followed by the central state of Al-Jazira, where roughly 1.1 million have gone back.

Published in Dawn, January 27th, 2026