UAE-linked network accused of hiring Colombian mercenary fighters for Sudan’s RSF

An Abu Dhabi-based security company with links to senior United Arab Emirates officials “appears to have hired” Colombian military contractors who deployed to Sudan to fight alongside the Rapid Support Forces, Human Rights Watch said in a new report that also alleged wider UAE backing for the paramilitary group.

The report, which was released on Monday, details how Colombian contractors were recruited in Colombia, moved through the UAE and other transit points, and later operated in Sudan’s Darfur region as the RSF tightened its siege of El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. HRW said the alleged support could amount to aiding or substantially contributing to war crimes and crimes against humanity by the RSF.

The RSF seized El Fasher in October 2025 after an 18-month siege that Human Rights Watch said included shelling, drone strikes, and restrictions that left civilians facing starvation. RSF fighters carried out mass killings and other abuses against civilians, as well as against wounded or disarmed fighters fleeing the city.

A later UN fact-finding mission found that the RSF’s conduct in and around El Fasher amounted to strong indicators of genocide against protected non-Arab communities, particularly the Zaghawa and Fur. The mission concluded that the 18-month siege deliberately created life-threatening conditions through starvation, denial of humanitarian aid, destruction of medical care, restrictions on movement, and attacks on civilian infrastructure. It said the October 2025 takeover was marked by mass killings, executions at exit points and berms, rape and other forms of sexual violence, torture, detention, enforced disappearances, and ethnically targeted abuse. The mission found that these acts were systematic, repeated, coordinated, and accompanied by dehumanising and exterminatory language, pointing to genocidal intent.

One survivor, identified as Amal, told HRW that RSF fighters stopped a group that included people with disabilities and children. “They had sniper rifles, … small weapons with silencers,” she said.

The report highlighted Bossaso, in Somalia’s Puntland state, as a second transit route for Colombian contractors bound for Sudan. One Colombian contractor told the group he reached Bossaso from Colombia on commercial flights in mid-March 2025 and stayed for about 10 days at what he described as a military base, with around 40 other Colombians housed in “underground bunkers.” HRW said it geolocated two videos the contractor shared to an area near the Puntland Maritime Police Force compound, close to Bossaso airport, where satellite imagery and video stills showed earth-covered structures and air-conditioning units consistent with his account of underground facilities.

The rights group said Bossaso’s role was significant because Puntland’s leadership is closely aligned with the UAE, which HRW said has funded, trained and supervised the Puntland Maritime Police Force since 2010. From the PMPF base, the contractor told HRW, the group flew privately to Abu Dhabi, where their passports were not stamped before they were taken by bus to a UAE military facility in Ghiyathi.

“Bossaso has a military base and that’s where everyone arrives. There are some people who stay there for a month, some for 20 days, others for eight days,” one contractor told HRW.

In November last year, an investigation by Middle East Eye alleged that military equipment had been moved from the United Arab Emirates through Bosaso to Sudan’s RSF, citing flight data, satellite imagery and a Puntland Maritime Police Force source. The source claimed that IL-76 cargo aircraft had repeatedly landed at the airport over the past two years, unloading sealed containers under armed guard before departing. The cargo was allegedly transferred onward via later flights routed through neighbouring countries, while local security personnel were reportedly barred from inspecting the shipments.

A senior port official told MEE that more than 500,000 UAE-linked containers marked as dangerous had passed through the port over two years without normal cargo documentation, before being moved quickly to the airport for onward transport. Separate monitoring of IL-76TD flights between Bosaso and eastern Libya in October 2025 suggested a recurring air corridor rather than isolated deliveries, with some aircraft reportedly linked to Benghazi, where UAE-backed forces operate. Sources in Bosaso also alleged that Colombian mercenaries had passed through the airport on their way to RSF units in Sudan, a claim reinforced by images cited by MEE and by a Colombian contractor previously interviewed by The Guardian.

The HRW report also named Global Security Services Group, as the Abu Dhabi-based company that appeared to have hired the Colombians. It said A4SI, a Colombia-based recruitment agency, initially recruited former military personnel, and that at least 300 Colombians had been deployed by September 2025. According to the report, some recruits were told they would guard oil infrastructure or work in the Middle East and Africa, while another contractor said he knew he was going to war.

In December last year, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned four individuals and four entities for their alleged roles in a Colombian-led transnational recruitment and financing network supporting RSF. The sanctioned individuals included Alvaro Andres Quijano Becerra, a dual Colombian-Italian retired military officer based in the United Arab Emirates, who was accused of playing a central role in recruiting and deploying former Colombian military personnel to Sudan. Also sanctioned were Claudia Viviana Oliveros Forero, owner and manager of A4SI, Mateo Andres Duque Botero, manager of Maine Global Corp S.A.S.; and Monica Muñoz Ucros, alternate manager of Maine Global Corp and manager of Comercializadora San Bendito. According to Treasury, these individuals supported the recruitment, contracting, movement and payment of Colombian fighters who provided military expertise to the RSF, including as infantry, artillery personnel, drone operators, vehicle operators and trainers.

Last month, OFAC imposed sanctions on another network of Colombian individuals and companies. The sanctioned network included Colombian national and former army colonel Jose Oscar Garcia Batte, who owns Global Qowa Al-Basheria S.A.S., also known as Mi Futuro Global. OFAC said Garcia Batte knowingly recruited former Colombian military personnel to join International Services Agency and its successor, Fénix Human Resources S.A.S., despite learning that personnel were being sent to Sudan to support the RSF. GQAB was also sanctioned for being owned or controlled by, or acting on behalf of, Garcia Batte, while Omar Fernando Garcia Batte was designated for his leadership role in the company.

OFAC also sanctioned Fénix Human Resources S.A.S., a Bogotá-based employment agency established by previously designated individuals Alvaro Andres Quijano Becerra and Claudia Viviana Oliveros Forero as a replacement for A4SI. Fénix was designated for engaging in actions that “threaten the peace, security and stability of Sudan” by supporting the recruitment pipeline for foreign fighters. Jose Libardo Quijano Torres, the nominal manager of Fénix, was also sanctioned for his leadership role in the company.

The HRW report joins a growing body of evidence pointing to the UAE’s entrenched involvement in Sudan’s war, which has become one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Through its growing influence over regional ports and logistics hubs, the UAE’s involvement has complicated the conflict and strengthened the RSF’s capabilities. Despite mounting evidence, the UAE continues to deny any involvement in the conflict.