Drone strikes cut power across Sudan’s Kassala State, monitor says, as Khartoum takes its case against Ethiopia to the UN and African Union


Satellite images from October 26 and November 2, 2026 of the Al Dabbah electricity substation in northern Sudan

Satellite images dated October 26 and November 2, 2026 of the Al Dabbah electricity substation in Sudan’s Northern State, which AfriMEOSINT says show damage to transformers after an RSF drone attack. Photo: AfriMEOSINT (@AfriMEOSINT) via X

Drones struck power substations in Sudan’s Kassala State before dawn on Monday, blacking out the state, a rights monitor said, as Khartoum accused Ethiopia at the UN of hosting the launches.

The Sudanese Observatory for Human Rights (@sudan_conflict) said shortly after midnight Eastern Time that drones of the Rapid Support Forces hit the New Halfa transformer station, badly damaging its main transformers and cutting electricity to all the towns of the state. Local sources told Al Jazeera that drones also struck power facilities in Aroma and a fuel station there, setting fires at both sites. The open source analyst AfriMEOSINT said a third substation, in Merowe in Northern State, was also targeted, and it published coordinates for the Aroma station.

The attacks come one day after drones hit substations in Al Dabbah in Northern State and Abu Hamad in River Nile State. AfriMEOSINT posted satellite images on Monday afternoon that it said confirmed damage to the transformers at Al Dabbah. According to the local sources quoted by Al Jazeera, RSF drones have struck 16 power stations and fuel depots in nine states over the past two weeks, from Gezira and Sennar to the Red Sea. The Darfur Network for Human Rights warned that the repeated damage threatens water supplies and health care and raises costs for families already in hardship.

Sudan’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday it had filed formal complaints with the UN Security Council and the African Union’s Peace and Security Council, accusing Ethiopia of “blatant aggression.” “The use of Ethiopian territory by the terrorist militia (RSF) to target Sudanese territory is considered a hostile act that places Ethiopia in violation of international law,” the ministry said, according to The New Arab. A government report described by AFP and DW Amharic counts 70 attacks between February and late October, involving 187 one way attack drones and 82 strikes with munitions dropped from drones, and says they killed 484 civilians and 176 soldiers and wounded 200 others. It says the drones were launched from Asosa and Bahir Dar, that October alone saw 28 attacks with 97 attack drones, and that a strike on displaced people at Wad el Mahi in Blue Nile State killed 30 civilians, 26 of them women and children. Sudan says it reserves the right to defend itself.

Egypt said on Monday it was fully ready to take “all necessary measures” allowed under international law and its joint defense agreement with Sudan, according to the joint statement from the third round of 2+2 talks between the two countries’ foreign and irrigation ministers, as reported by Alhurra. UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric called for an immediate end to the fighting and warned that drone attacks on energy infrastructure were causing widespread power outages.

Ethiopia rejects the accusation. At the Security Council on October 16, its ambassador, Tesfaye Yilma Sabo, called Sudan’s drone claim “a baseless accusation,” and Addis Ababa in turn accuses Sudan’s army of backing Tigrayan forces. Ethiopia had not answered the new complaints publicly by Monday night. Asharq Bloomberg, citing two sources, reported on Monday that Ethiopia had declared all staff of Sudan’s consulate in Asosa, the capital of Benishangul Gumuz region, persona non grata, and Al Arabiya reported that the consulate was being closed and its staff given 48 hours to leave. Ethiopian officials had not confirmed the move publicly. Mereja Media sent questions to Ethiopia’s Government Communication Service on October 31 about Sudan’s drone accusations and on November 1 about cargo flights from the Emirates, and has received no reply to either.

The cargo flights

AfriMEOSINT, an account on X that follows military and cargo flights in Africa and the Middle East, said late on October 31 that what it calls the UAE to Ethiopia airlift reached “the highest monthly level I have ever recorded,” with at least 81 suspicious cargo flights in October. Of those, it said, 52 left from Al Ain Airport, 26 from Al Reef Airbase, two from Fujairah and one from Sharjah, and about 23 were Boeing 747 freighters flying from Al Ain to Bole International Airport in Addis Ababa.

On November 1 the account said one of those aircraft, a Boeing 747 freighter registered ER MAM and operated by Pecotox Air, which it described as linked to the UAE government, had carried Toyota Land Cruiser pickups on 13 flights from Al Ain to Bole since October 11, and it posted a photo it said showed the vehicles being unloaded at Bole’s cargo terminal. “They will likely end up in RSF hands,” it wrote. Pickups such as these are the backbone of the RSF’s fighting units, which mount machine guns and anti aircraft weapons on them, though the Ethiopian government, which is fighting insurgencies at home, has also relied on imported equipment and some cargo could be for its own forces. On Monday the account reported two more Ilyushin Il 76 freighters leaving the Emirates for Ethiopia, one from Al Ain and one from Al Reef that it said was likely heading to Asosa.

AfriMEOSINT did not say who took the Bole photo, and the destination of the vehicles is its own assessment. Mereja Media could not independently verify the flights, the cargo or where the vehicles went. Ethiopian Airlines, which runs the cargo terminal at Bole, has not commented. The UAE has repeatedly denied supplying the RSF, and a senior UAE official told The National on February 12, 2026 that the country “categorically rejects allegations that it has provided, financed, transported or facilitated any weapons, ammunition, drones, vehicles, guided munitions or other military equipment to the RSF, whether directly or indirectly.”

On Monday evening Sudan’s army said its air defenses shot down an FH 95 drone south of Wad Banda in West Kordofan, according to Sudanese Echo, an account on X, which shared video it said showed the interception. The Sudanese Observatory for Human Rights called the Kassala strike a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law and said service facilities need immediate protection.

Sources

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