THE United States imposed sanctions on a Sudanese paramilitary leader today for acts of violence and human rights abuses committed by his troops in their conflict with the country’s army.

The US Treasury said it had sanctioned Abdelrahim, a senior military commander and brother of Mohammed Hamdan Daglo who is head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), for his role in “the massacre of civilians, ethnic killings and the use of sexual violence.”

This comes as the United Nations migration agency said today that more than five million people have now been displaced by the fighting.

The International Organisation for Migration says that more than four million people have been internally displaced since the conflict erupted in mid-April while around a million people have fled to neighbouring countries. 

The agency said that more than 750,000 have travelled to either Egypt or Chad.

Sudan was plunged into chaos almost five months ago when long-simmering tensions between the military, led by General Abdel Fattah Burhan, and the RSF escalated into open warfare.

The fighting has reduced Sudan’s capital Khartoum to an urban battlefield.

Formal peace negotiations mediated by Saudi Arabia were adjourned in late June with the military and the RSF both called out for continually violating truces they had agreed to.