Survivors of an airstrike that killed scores of Sudanese gold miners on the Egypt-Sudan border are heading back to the mines, saying they have no other way to earn a living.
“I need to go get my gold,” 26-year-old Sharaf al-Din Ali told AFP from a waystation south of the border, where he was waiting for a truck to Jabal al-Uqaydat. He had just helped bury his friend with at least two dozen others in a shallow grave. He said he would go one last time, but added that he cannot leave gold mining altogether.
Ali dropped out of college when war broke out between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in April 2023. He is one of millions who have turned to the gold trade, which funds both sides of the conflict. Nearly all of the gold is routed through the United Arab Emirates, much of it first passing through Egypt.
Ali Mohamed Hamdan, 29, was drinking tea with fellow miners on October 10 when an aircraft began circling. “It made three rounds, on the fourth it fired a missile,” he told AFP from a cot in eastern Sudan, where he recovered from minor injuries.
The Emergency Lawyers, a Sudanese rights group, said at least 72 people were killed and blamed the Egyptian military. Egypt said it carried out an operation against illegal miners “within its territory”.
