Fresh from battles won with weapons from the UAE, the Sudanese general is taking a victory lap

Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan, the leader of a notorious paramilitary force fighting for supremacy in Sudan's civil war, is not the president of his country. But on a recent whirlwind tour of six African countries, he was treated just like one.

Some of the continent's most powerful leaders rolled out the red carpet for General Hamdan after he arrived for meetings on a luxury plane in late December and early January, having swapped his military gear for business suits. In Kenya, traditional dancers waited at the plane steps. In South Africa, he sank into an armchair next to smiling President Cyril Ramaphosa.

And in Rwanda, General Hamdan solemnly posed at a memorial for the victims of the 1994 genocide – even as his own troops have been accused of genocide in Sudan's Darfur region.

The surprise tour was a remarkable comeback for a commander often said to be dead or wounded since Sudan entered the war in April. General Hamdan's Rapid Support Forces roll through Sudan, defeating the country's regular army in retreat – thanks in large part to military support from the United Arab Emirates, a Persian Gulf petrostate emerging as a kingmaker in the Horn of Africa, according to a new report from United Nations researchers.

The unpublished report, obtained by The New York Times, provides new details on how the Emirates has been smuggling powerful weapons through Chad to General Hamdan's forces, known as the RSF, since last summer – armed drones, howitzers and anti-aircraft missiles. shipped via secret cargo flights and desert smuggling routes. The supplies have boosted his forces to a string of victories that have changed the course of the war in recent months.

“This new RSF firepower had a huge impact on the balance of forces, both in Darfur and in other regions of Sudan,” the report said.

The war has brought Sudan to a total catastrophe, killing at least 12,000 people and driving another 7.4 million from their homes since April. United Nations estimates. The fighting has destroyed large parts of the capital Khartoum, and 25 million of Sudan's 45 million residents need emergency aid to survive.

Experts say the Emirates are using their vast wealth and advanced weapons to determine the course of a turbulent region of Africa, wracked by conflict but endowed with vast natural resources and a long Red Sea coastline.

The motivations are ambiguous; Experts point to the Emirates' desire for port deals and agricultural land in a part of Africa it increasingly sees as its strategic backyard, and long-standing hostility toward Islamist forces.

But the latest UN report, compiled by experts monitoring the 2005 arms embargo on Darfur, highlights the costs of these ambitions. It documents the widespread violence against civilians that accompanied the advance of General Hamdan's forces: massacres, bombings and reports of hundreds of rapes that echo the genocide in Darfur two decades ago.

That pattern of atrocities prompted U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken to formally accuse the RSF on December 6 of war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing. (Mr Blinken said the other side of the war – the Sudanese military – had also committed war crimes through indiscriminate bombing.)

Weeks later, General Hamdan, also known as Hemeti, boarded a Boeing from Royal Jet, a company run by an adviser to the President of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.

In a statement, the Emirates said it “did not supply arms and ammunition to any of the warring parties” and denied violating the arms embargo. It said its priority was to protect civilians and, through diplomacy with American, Arab and African partners, seek a peaceful solution to the conflict.

These denials, however, are being met with increasingly vocal skepticism from U.S. officials, who fear that Sudan could slide toward famine, genocide or a new round of brutal, autocratic rule if the Rapid Support Forces win the war.

The RSF did not respond to questions for this article.

In early December, the Biden administration announced that Vice President Kamala Harris had done so directly addressed the war in Sudan with Sheikh Mohamed on the sidelines of a UN climate summit. Over Christmas, Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, made the point more forcefully in a phone call to his Emirati counterpart, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, according to a senior US official with knowledge of the call who spoke anonymously to discuss private conversations.

Yet many U.S. lawmakers — and privately even some senior Biden administration officials — say the efforts are still too timid, and blame the State Department for failing to, along with Saudi Arabia, to come up with a plan to end the war, despite months of diplomatic efforts.

The CIA recently circulated its assessment of an outright RSF victory in Sudan under President Biden and other senior officials, saying it would spread abuses and hinder the spread of democracy in the region, US officials said. The US is also concerned about General Hamdan's ties to Russia's Wagner mercenaries, who supplied him with anti-aircraft missiles in the early months of the war.

These concerns are growing in parallel with external calls for more urgent US intervention in Sudan, including a stronger stance against interference in the Emirates that critics call disastrous.

“In its pursuit of influence and security, the UAE could ultimately plunge the entire region into chaos,” said Michelle Gavin, a scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations. wrote recently.

General Hamdan, once a camel trader, rose to prominence in the late 2000s as commander of the ruthless militia known as the janjaweed in Darfur. He amassed a war chest by building a business empire – first by controlling gold mines, then as an ally of the Emirates.

Starting in about 2016, General Hamdan sent fighters to Yemen on the Emirati payroll, later investing those profits in a network of about 50 companies, headquartered in Dubai, in the Emirates that still finance his war machine, UN officials found researchers.

Last July, the Emirates doubled their lead over General Hamdan. A new Emirati-built hospital appeared in Amdjarass, a remote town in eastern Chad, offering medical treatment to Sudanese refugees. But Western intelligence services soon realized that cargo planes were indeed landing on a nearby runway with weapons intended for the RSF

In its statement, the Emirates called the field hospital “a crucial lifeline for civilians in need of medical care” and said it had invited UN inspectors to visit it.

Within weeks, General Hamdan's soldiers began advancing through Darfur, eventually capturing four of the five regional capitals. But it was the conquest of Wad Madani, a city in the breadbasket of central Sudan, which caused the greatest unrest of the war on December 15.

The sudden defeat a humiliating blow to the Sudanese army in the political heart of the country, with calls for the resignation of its leader, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. It also fueled fears that General Hamdan could conquer the entire country.

Ethnic militias have formed across eastern Sudan in recent weeks to fend off possible advances by the RSF, Sudanese media reported. And Islamist hardliners, largely absent from public view in recent years, have reemerged to become a loud voice in Sudanese politics.

The Emirati operation in support of General Hamdan has been a source of alarm for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, a global network that prides itself on neutrality. Red Cross officials are concerned about Emirati press reports with the Red Crescent logo about relief operations in Amdjarass allegedly led by the Emirates Red Crescent.

In response to questions, the International Federation, which oversees 191 national associations, said it had sent a “fact-finding mission” to Chad in October and another mission next month. “If an allegation is substantiated, the IFRC will initiate an investigation,” a spokesman, Tommaso Della Longa, said in an email.

Several U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said the Biden administration has named Tom Perriello, a former Democratic Party diplomat and congressman, as special envoy to Sudan. But the appointment has been postponed due to a dispute over who Mr Perriello would report to and how much authority he would exercise – especially when it comes to the Emirates, one of the officials said.

General Hamdan continued his diplomatic offensive on Thursday and met in Uganda with Ramtane Lamamra, the new UN envoy to Sudan. For Sudanese critics, the smart suits and smooth talk are just a tactic as General Hamdan prepares for the next round of fighting, pointing to his New Year's Day speech as evidence of his bad faith.

In a videotaped speech, General Hamdan wished Christians in Sudan a Merry Christmas, days ahead of his troops a church burned. He then denounced “race-based killings,” despite the massacres in Darfur.

But the commander did strike one tone that many Sudanese could agree with. “One question is on the minds of the Sudanese people,” General Hamdan said. “Where are we going?”

Julian E. Barnes contributed reporting from Washington.