Sudan has taken its drone war to the UN: Khartoum said late Sunday that it filed complaints against Ethiopia with the UN Security Council and the African Union's Peace and Security Council, over drone attacks it says the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) launched from Ethiopian territory against civilian sites and power stations across Sudan. The filing rests on a Sudanese report alleging 70 attacks since February, involving 187 one-way attack drones, that killed or wounded 484 civilians. Every figure in that sentence is Sudan's own, published here as its claim: Ethiopia has denied the allegations and says it respects Sudan's sovereignty, and no independent verification of the launch-site claims was available in the reporting opened. What is not in dispute is the act itself — a formal complaint by one state against a neighbour, in the middle of a civil war that has already displaced nearly 13 million people.
What exactly has Sudan filed?
Two complaints, announced in a Foreign Ministry statement late Sunday. The ministry said the attacks targeted civilian sites and electricity stations in several Sudanese states, causing civilian casualties and disrupting essential services, and that it submitted documents which it maintained showed the RSF using Ethiopian territory to launch explosive-laden and missile-equipped drones against civilian facilities and vital infrastructure. It described the alleged use of Ethiopian territory as a hostile act and accused Addis Ababa of violating the UN Charter — the Africa Press account of the statement puts the claim precisely, as a violation of Article 2(4) — and it called on Ethiopia to halt hostile actions. It also urged the international community to hold the RSF accountable and to apply international law to the Ethiopian government. There was no immediate response from Ethiopia to the statement itself.
What does Sudan's report allege?
Seventy attacks in eight months, from three named launch areas. According to a report by Sudan's army-led Transitional Sovereignty Council, launching sites at Asosa airport, the Kurmuk-Gizen border area and Bahir Dar air base hosted 70 separate attacks between February 15 and October 27, involving 187 one-way attack drones; the report said last month alone saw 28 attacks carried out by 97 drones. The council stated that these strikes killed or wounded 484 civilians, killed 176 Sudanese soldiers and wounded 200 more. Sudan says its evidence was gathered from downed aircraft, flight data and military records. No independent verification of that evidence had been reported in the sources opened, so the report's numbers are carried throughout this article as Sudan's figures — the toll its investigators compiled, not an independently confirmed count. The immediate trigger for the filing was closer in time: the complaints followed drone attacks targeting 13 electricity stations in Khartoum, Al-Jazira, Sennar and Al-Qadarif since the previous Monday, the europesays report said.
How has Ethiopia answered?
With a denial, and a counter-accusation. Sudan has repeatedly accused Ethiopia of supporting the RSF and allowing drones to be launched from its territory; Ethiopia has denied the allegations and said it respects Sudan's sovereignty. Ethiopia counters that Khartoum supports Tigrayan rebels — an assertion Sudan rejects. The two denials now sit either side of a formal legal filing, which changes what happens next even though it changes no facts on the ground: the Security Council and the AU Peace and Security Council have both been handed the same dossier, and Sudan's stated position is that the use of Ethiopian territory to target Sudanese land places Ethiopia before international law. The UN's own voice in the same days was about the drones themselves rather than their origin: a spokesman for Secretary-General António Guterres said he was appalled by the impact of drone strikes in Sudan and strongly condemned the escalating drone attacks by the parties to the conflict — a condemnation of the weapon's toll on civilians that did not take up Khartoum's attribution.
Why does this filing matter beyond the two capitals?
Because it internationalises the region's most dangerous war at the moment the war's signature weapon is escalating. Sudan's army and the RSF have been at war since April 2023, in a conflict stemming from disagreements over integrating the paramilitary into the military; it has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced nearly 13 million and worsened famine across the country, according to UN and international estimates. Drones have become central to both sides' campaigns — UN estimates cited in the reporting opened put drone deaths across Sudan at over 1,100 in the first half of this year alone. A complaint that names a neighbouring state's airports and an air base as launch sites, and asks two security councils to act on it, is the point at which a civil war's spillover stops being an accusation in a press statement and becomes a case other governments must answer. Whether either council takes it up — and whether Sudan's evidence is ever independently examined — is the test the filing now sets.
This report is drawn from Al Jazeera's November 2, 2026 report, opened and read in full via its verbatim carrier jamaicainquirer.com, the europesays.com report of the filing opened in full, News Central TV's November 1 report of the Sovereignty Council's findings opened in full, and the Africa Press account of the Foreign Ministry statement opened via search. The launch-site, attack-count and casualty figures are Sudan's, attributed to its report and ministry throughout, with Ethiopia's denial and counter-accusation carried alongside, per the two-source rule for contested claims; no independent verification of the launch claims was available in the reporting opened.
