Middle East Eye • April 8, 2026 11:57

Exclusive: The Ethiopian army base covertly supporting Sudan’s RSF

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Oscar Rickett
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Wed, 04/08/2026 - 13:00

Satellite imagery collected since December reveals a base at Asosa, connected to UAE supply lines, facilitating the Rapid Support Forces

The Ethiopian army base at Asosa providing support for Sudan's Rapid Support Forces, shown on 29 March 2026 (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs/Analysis Yale HRL)
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Ethiopia is covertly supporting Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces paramilitary from an army base in the country’s Benishangul-Gumuz region, Middle East Eye can reveal. 

Satellite imagery analysed by the Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab and seen exclusively by MEE shows, over many months, a wide range of activity consistent with alleged military assistance to the RSF at an Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF) base on the outskirts of the western city of Asosa. 

From December to the end of March, as the RSF conducted intense cross-border attacks on Sudanese army positions in Sudan’s Blue Nile state, car transporters rolled in and out of the Asosa base carrying technical vehicles, while tents capable of holding up to 150 fighters appeared and supplies were dispersed. 

In February, 200 technical vehicles were seen at the base. Unarmed technical vehicles were retrofitted with gun mounts capable of holding heavy machine guns, while vehicles consistent with those seen at Asosa were also sighted in the midst of RSF battles in Blue Nile. 

The satellite imagery seen first by MEE and published in a report by Yale’s HRL later today, alongside photos and videos posted online, connects the car transporters and other vehicles seen at Asosa with Berbera, the Somaliland city port that hosts a base run by the United Arab Emirates.  

Technical vehicles the same colour, size and with the same armament as those seen in Asosa can also be seen in footage of fighting in and around the Sudanese border town of Kurmuk, only 100km from the Ethiopian army base and which was captured after fierce fighting by the RSF and its allies from the Sudan People's Liberation Movement–North (SPLM-N) at the end of March.

“Since the fall of last year there have been allegations that Ethiopia has allowed the RSF to base its attacks on Blue Nile from Ethiopia,” Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of Yale’s HRL, told Middle East Eye.

“This report is the first visual evidence that those allegations are true. In fact, it is even worse than first feared. Not only are the Ethiopians assisting the RSF, they are doing it from an actual Ethiopian army base.”

Multiple sources, including former and serving Ethiopian army officers, Sudanese army and intelligence analysts, a European diplomat, and a former Ethiopian foreign ministry adviser, confirmed to MEE that there is a base used by the RSF in the remote, war-torn region of Benishangul-Gumuz, but that its exact location has remained a closely guarded secret. 

The sources told MEE that the UAE, which continues to deny supporting the RSF despite mounting evidence, was crucial to Ethiopia’s involvement in the Sudan war, which broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and RSF in April 2023 and has led to the largest humanitarian crisis in the world, with hundreds of thousands killed and over 11 million people displaced from their homes.

A UN fact-finding mission recently concluded that the RSF committed genocide when it captured el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. Civilians fleeing the city told MEE that RSF fighters raped, executed, and took blood from men, women and children trying to escape. 

A former Ethiopian government adviser told MEE that “many in Ethiopia’s foreign ministry and elsewhere believe the UAE has been calling the shots in Ethiopia in regard to the Sudan government, RSF and Eritrea over the port of Assab for at least two years”. 

The RSF, the office of Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the Ethiopian foreign ministry did not respond to MEE’s requests for comment. 

Abdulkhaleq Abdulla, an Emirati academic and former adviser to UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, recently criticised the “singling out” of the UAE over its support for the RSF, noting that the Sudanese paramilitary “has support from Uganda, from Ethiopia, from Chad”. The SAF, the RSF's enemy, receives most of its military support from Turkey and Egypt.

Attacks on Sudan launched from Ethiopia

According to Yale’s HRL, support for the RSF from the Asosa base dates back to at least 8 November last year, when satellite imagery showed the arrival of 15 cargo trucks across two locations.

After this, non-ENDF commercial car transporters repeatedly travelled to the Asosa base and offloaded technical vehicles, 200 of which were seen at the site in February, that are not used by the Ethiopian army. Yale’s HRL monitored 14 other ENDF bases in the region and found no comparable activity there, indicating that Asosa is an outlier.

Open-source videos posted early in November show car transporters allegedly carrying white and tan-coloured technical vehicles from Berbera, the port in the breakaway region of Somaliland that hosts a UAE base, to RSF fighters operating from bases in Ethiopia. 

Car transporters can be seen in satellite imagery of the Asosa base from 18 February and 29 March and are consistent with the colour and dimensions of those seen in the videos. Further video footage shows these carriers heading in the direction of Asosa to the east of the city, carrying white technical vehicles that match those seen in the videos.

These same technical vehicles then appear to be present in photos and videos taken during fighting in and around Kurmuk, the Sudanese border town just 100km from the military base at Asosa. The subject of fierce fighting, Kurmuk was taken by the RSF and allied fighters at the end of March. 

Over the same time period,  and despite the war on Iran directly impacting the UAE, flight tracking data shows multiple UAE-linked IL-76 cargo planes flying from Abu Dhabi to different airports in Ethiopia, including Bahir Dar in the Amhara region, about 300km from Asosa. 

At Asosa airport, Yale HRL identified transport aircraft in February and March. A helicopter measuring 20m in length and consistent with a MI-17 was visible from 18 February onwards. A cargo plane, most likely a C-130, a fleet of which are operated by the UAE, was also seen from 9 March.

While vehicles were rolling out of Asosa toward Kurmuk, the Ethiopian army was conducting a mass deployment of troops, vehicles, tanks and drones northwards to Tigray, more than 1,500km away, where the Ethiopian government’s conflict with the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) continues to simmer and where an invasion of Eritrea could be launched.  

UAE doubles down on Ethiopia 

At the time the vehicles were seen travelling from Berbera to Ethiopia, tensions between the Somali government in Mogadishu and Abu Dhabi were growing over the UAE’s support for Somaliland and Puntland, another breakaway region that houses a major Emirati base, at the port of Bosaso. 

Both Berbera and Bosaso were part of a network of Emirati bases, developed with Israel and the US, that formed a ring of control around the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. They are also part of the UAE supply lines running to the RSF in Sudan.

On 26 December last year, Israel, a key Emirati ally, became the first country to formally recognise the sovereignty of Somaliland, and discussions about an Israeli base at Berbera began in earnest. 

On 12 January, Somalia cancelled all agreements with the UAE, including at the ports of Berbera and Bosaso. With its interests in Somalia now severely complicated, the UAE’s relationship with Ethiopia became ever more crucial. 

Since Abiy Ahmed became Ethiopia’s prime minister in 2018, economic, security and military ties between Ethiopia and the UAE have become stronger and stronger.

“Addis Ababa will stick with the UAE,” Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst focusing on North Africa and political economy, told MEE in the aftermath of the fallout between the UAE and Saudi Arabia. 

“The Emiratis are therefore focusing military operations on Ethiopian territory, preparing a major offensive as Saudi actions have disrupted other staging areas.”

Goitom Gebreluel, a researcher and political analyst on the Horn of Africa, outlined two key issues at play for Ethiopia’s government.

“First, you have the broader and obvious geopolitical dynamics. The web of alliances that links Ethiopia’s aspirations with those of the UAE and thus the RSF against those of Eritrea and Egypt, among others,” he told MEE.

“Secondly, the domestic security dilemma. Tensions between Addis Ababa and Burhan date back to at least 2020 and the Tigray war, when the TPLF were supported by Burhan,” he said, referring to SAF chief Abdul Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan’s de facto leader. 

“Last year, Abiy sent a high-level delegation to Sudan, where they unsuccessfully tried to convince Burhan to abandon support for the TPLF. These are the primary motivations for Ethiopia’s involvement in Sudan.”

Present at this high-level delegation was Getachew Reda, an adviser to Abiy who said in a post on Facebook that Ethiopia could not “behave as a passive bystander” in the war in Sudan and that it should not be attacked for “seeking to protect its strategic interests in the context of the Sudanese conflict”.

On 3 March, the Sudanese government, which backs the SAF, openly accused Ethiopia of involvement in the war. 

On 25 January, the RSF launched a broad offensive on Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) positions in Blue Nile state.

At the time, a Sudanese intelligence source told MEE that the RSF and allied fighters had come from South Sudan and Ethiopia, both of which border Blue Nile.

From the end of December to the last week of March, there was a build-up at the base of tents, vehicle traffic and logistics activity that Yale’s HRL said was “consistent with high tempo military support operations”. 

Multiple “Conex” commercial shipping containers arrived, and supplies were dispersed. Between five and 15 tents capable of holding up to 150 people were also erected. This kind of activity has not been observed at other ENDF bases in the region.

Commercial transport vehicles that do not resemble the ones used by the Ethiopian military were frequently seen arriving and departing the Asosa base. 

In satellite imagery from 27 March 2026, a white car transporter loaded with at least two light-coloured vehicles can be seen on the main road east of Mendi, which is 95km by road to the south-east of Asosa, on the main road heading east.

Exclusive: UAE flights linked to Sudan war tracked from Israel to Ethiopia
Read More »

Mendi also sits along routes that connect Ethiopia from east to west, as well as to Berbera, Somalia, in the east. The car transporter seen on this road is followed by a blue transport vehicle carrying a standard Conex container.

Imagery from March shows 40 possible armoured personnel carriers. According to Yale’s HRL, unarmed technical vehicles were retrofitted with gun mounts for heavy machine guns. In imagery from February, objects measuring 1.6m consistent with 50-calibre machine guns are present in rows on the ground near the vehicles fitted with mounts.

The base at Asosa also has multiple fuel tanks. This means that unlike the alleged RSF base identified by Reuters in the nearby Menge district of Benishangul-Gumuz, it can support the mass refuelling of these vehicles. 

White and darker coloured technical vehicles, both mounted and unmounted, seen in the satellite imagery are consistent with those used by the RSF in its Blue Nile combat operations, which continue to this day.

“Asosa is a key logistics node for activity consistent with military assistance from the ENDF to the RSF,” Yale’s HRL says in its report. 

“It is well situated to provide resupply, refuelling, housing and vehicle maintenance” for RSF forces inside Blue Nile state, and the “activity observed there is consistent with Asosa base performing these functions for the non-ENDF personnel that appear present there over the five- month period covered by this report”.

Sudan war

Zecharias Zelalem

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Exclusive: The Ethiopian army base covertly supporting Sudan’s RSF Submitted by Oscar Rickett on Wed, 04/08/2026 - 13:00 Satellite imagery collected since December reveals a base at Asosa, connected to UAE supply lines, facilitating the Rapid Support Forces The Ethiopian army base at Asosa providing support for Sudan's Rapid Support Forces, shown on 29 March 2026 (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs/Analysis Yale HRL) Off Ethiopia is covertly supporting Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces paramilitary from an army base in the country’s Benishangul-Gumuz region, Middle East Eye can reveal.  Satellite imagery analysed by the Yale School of Public Health’s Humanitarian Research Lab and seen exclusively by MEE shows, over many months, a wide range of activity consistent with alleged military assistance to the RSF at an Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF) base on the outskirts of the western city of Asosa.  From December to the end of March, as the RSF conducted intense cross-border attacks on Sudanese army positions in Sudan’s Blue Nile state, car transporters rolled in and out of the Asosa base carrying technical vehicles, while tents capable of holding up to 150 fighters appeared and supplies were dispersed.  In February, 200 technical vehicles were seen at the base. Unarmed technical vehicles were retrofitted with gun mounts capable of holding heavy machine guns, while vehicles consistent with those seen at Asosa were also sighted in the midst of RSF battles in Blue Nile.  The satellite imagery seen first by MEE and published in a report by Yale’s HRL later today, alongside photos and videos posted online, connects the car transporters and other vehicles seen at Asosa with Berbera, the Somaliland city port that hosts a base run by the United Arab Emirates.   Technical vehicles the same colour, size and with the same armament as those seen in Asosa can also be seen in footage of fighting in and around the Sudanese border town of Kurmuk, only 100km from the Ethiopian army base and which was captured after fierce fighting by the RSF and its allies from the Sudan People's Liberation Movement–North (SPLM-N) at the end of March. “Since the fall of last year there have been allegations that Ethiopia has allowed the RSF to base its attacks on Blue Nile from Ethiopia,” Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of Yale’s HRL, told Middle East Eye. “This report is the first visual evidence that those allegations are true. In fact, it is even worse than first feared. Not only are the Ethiopians assisting the RSF, they are doing it from an actual Ethiopian army base.” Technical vehicles seen at the Ethiopian army base in Asosa (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs / Analysis Yale HRL) Multiple sources, including former and serving Ethiopian army officers, Sudanese army and intelligence analysts, a European diplomat, and a former Ethiopian foreign ministry adviser, confirmed to MEE that there is a base used by the RSF in the remote, war-torn region of Benishangul-Gumuz, but that its exact location has remained a closely guarded secret.  The sources told MEE that the UAE, which continues to deny supporting the RSF despite mounting evidence, was crucial to Ethiopia’s involvement in the Sudan war, which broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and RSF in April 2023 and has led to the largest humanitarian crisis in the world, with hundreds of thousands killed and over 11 million people displaced from their homes. A UN fact-finding mission recently concluded that the RSF committed genocide when it captured el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. Civilians fleeing the city told MEE that RSF fighters raped, executed, and took blood from men, women and children trying to escape.  A former Ethiopian government adviser told MEE that “many in Ethiopia’s foreign ministry and elsewhere believe the UAE has been calling the shots in Ethiopia in regard to the Sudan government, RSF and Eritrea over the port of Assab for at least two years”.  The RSF, the office of Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and the Ethiopian foreign ministry did not respond to MEE’s requests for comment.  Abdulkhaleq Abdulla, an Emirati academic and former adviser to UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, recently criticised the “singling out” of the UAE over its support for the RSF, noting that the Sudanese paramilitary “has support from Uganda, from Ethiopia, from Chad”. The SAF, the RSF's enemy, receives most of its military support from Turkey and Egypt. Attacks on Sudan launched from Ethiopia According to Yale’s HRL, support for the RSF from the Asosa base dates back to at least 8 November last year, when satellite imagery showed the arrival of 15 cargo trucks across two locations. After this, non-ENDF commercial car transporters repeatedly travelled to the Asosa base and offloaded technical vehicles, 200 of which were seen at the site in February, that are not used by the Ethiopian army. Yale’s HRL monitored 14 other ENDF bases in the region and found no comparable activity there, indicating that Asosa is an outlier. Open-source videos posted early in November show car transporters allegedly carrying white and tan-coloured technical vehicles from Berbera, the port in the breakaway region of Somaliland that hosts a UAE base, to RSF fighters operating from bases in Ethiopia.  Car transporters can be seen in satellite imagery of the Asosa base from 18 February and 29 March and are consistent with the colour and dimensions of those seen in the videos. Further video footage shows these carriers heading in the direction of Asosa to the east of the city, carrying white technical vehicles that match those seen in the videos. These same technical vehicles then appear to be present in photos and videos taken during fighting in and around Kurmuk, the Sudanese border town just 100km from the military base at Asosa. The subject of fierce fighting, Kurmuk was taken by the RSF and allied fighters at the end of March.  Technical vehicles and cargo trucks seen at the Ethiopian army base in Asosa (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs / Analysis Yale HRL) Over the same time period,  and despite the war on Iran directly impacting the UAE, flight tracking data shows multiple UAE-linked IL-76 cargo planes flying from Abu Dhabi to different airports in Ethiopia, including Bahir Dar in the Amhara region, about 300km from Asosa.  At Asosa airport, Yale HRL identified transport aircraft in February and March. A helicopter measuring 20m in length and consistent with a MI-17 was visible from 18 February onwards. A cargo plane, most likely a C-130, a fleet of which are operated by the UAE, was also seen from 9 March. While vehicles were rolling out of Asosa toward Kurmuk, the Ethiopian army was conducting a mass deployment of troops, vehicles, tanks and drones northwards to Tigray, more than 1,500km away, where the Ethiopian government’s conflict with the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) continues to simmer and where an invasion of Eritrea could be launched.   UAE doubles down on Ethiopia  At the time the vehicles were seen travelling from Berbera to Ethiopia, tensions between the Somali government in Mogadishu and Abu Dhabi were growing over the UAE’s support for Somaliland and Puntland, another breakaway region that houses a major Emirati base, at the port of Bosaso.  Both Berbera and Bosaso were part of a network of Emirati bases, developed with Israel and the US, that formed a ring of control around the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. They are also part of the UAE supply lines running to the RSF in Sudan. On 26 December last year, Israel, a key Emirati ally, became the first country to formally recognise the sovereignty of Somaliland, and discussions about an Israeli base at Berbera began in earnest.  On 12 January, Somalia cancelled all agreements with the UAE, including at the ports of Berbera and Bosaso. With its interests in Somalia now severely complicated, the UAE’s relationship with Ethiopia became ever more crucial.  Since Abiy Ahmed became Ethiopia’s prime minister in 2018, economic, security and military ties between Ethiopia and the UAE have become stronger and stronger. Vehicles can be seen at the base at Asosa on 29 December 2025 (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs / Analysis Yale HRL) “Addis Ababa will stick with the UAE,” Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst focusing on North Africa and political economy, told MEE in the aftermath of the fallout between the UAE and Saudi Arabia.  “The Emiratis are therefore focusing military operations on Ethiopian territory, preparing a major offensive as Saudi actions have disrupted other staging areas.” Goitom Gebreluel, a researcher and political analyst on the Horn of Africa, outlined two key issues at play for Ethiopia’s government. “First, you have the broader and obvious geopolitical dynamics. The web of alliances that links Ethiopia’s aspirations with those of the UAE and thus the RSF against those of Eritrea and Egypt, among others,” he told MEE. “Secondly, the domestic security dilemma. Tensions between Addis Ababa and Burhan date back to at least 2020 and the Tigray war, when the TPLF were supported by Burhan,” he said, referring to SAF chief Abdul Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan’s de facto leader.  “Last year, Abiy sent a high-level delegation to Sudan, where they unsuccessfully tried to convince Burhan to abandon support for the TPLF. These are the primary motivations for Ethiopia’s involvement in Sudan.” Present at this high-level delegation was Getachew Reda, an adviser to Abiy who said in a post on Facebook that Ethiopia could not “behave as a passive bystander” in the war in Sudan and that it should not be attacked for “seeking to protect its strategic interests in the context of the Sudanese conflict”. On 3 March, the Sudanese government, which backs the SAF, openly accused Ethiopia of involvement in the war.  Vehicles, tents and possible APCs can be seen at Asosa on 29 March 2026 (Imagery © 2026 Planet Labs / Analysis Yale HRL) On 25 January, the RSF launched a broad offensive on Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) positions in Blue Nile state. At the time, a Sudanese intelligence source told MEE that the RSF and allied fighters had come from South Sudan and Ethiopia, both of which border Blue Nile. From the end of December to the last week of March, there was a build-up at the base of tents, vehicle traffic and logistics activity that Yale’s HRL said was “consistent with high tempo military support operations”.  Multiple “Conex” commercial shipping containers arrived, and supplies were dispersed. Between five and 15 tents capable of holding up to 150 people were also erected. This kind of activity has not been observed at other ENDF bases in the region. Commercial transport vehicles that do not resemble the ones used by the Ethiopian military were frequently seen arriving and departing the Asosa base.  In satellite imagery from 27 March 2026, a white car transporter loaded with at least two light-coloured vehicles can be seen on the main road east of Mendi, which is 95km by road to the south-east of Asosa, on the main road heading east. Exclusive: UAE flights linked to Sudan war tracked from Israel to Ethiopia Read More » Mendi also sits along routes that connect Ethiopia from east to west, as well as to Berbera, Somalia, in the east. The car transporter seen on this road is followed by a blue transport vehicle carrying a standard Conex container. Imagery from March shows 40 possible armoured personnel carriers. According to Yale’s HRL, unarmed technical vehicles were retrofitted with gun mounts for heavy machine guns. In imagery from February, objects measuring 1.6m consistent with 50-calibre machine guns are present in rows on the ground near the vehicles fitted with mounts. The base at Asosa also has multiple fuel tanks. This means that unlike the alleged RSF base identified by Reuters in the nearby Menge district of Benishangul-Gumuz, it can support the mass refuelling of these vehicles.  White and darker coloured technical vehicles, both mounted and unmounted, seen in the satellite imagery are consistent with those used by the RSF in its Blue Nile combat operations, which continue to this day. “Asosa is a key logistics node for activity consistent with military assistance from the ENDF to the RSF,” Yale’s HRL says in its report.  “It is well situated to provide resupply, refuelling, housing and vehicle maintenance” for RSF forces inside Blue Nile state, and the “activity observed there is consistent with Asosa base performing these functions for the non-ENDF personnel that appear present there over the five- month period covered by this report”. Sudan war Zecharias Zelalem News Post Date Override 0 Update Date Mon, 05/04/2020 - 21:19 Update Date Override 0

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Exclusive: The Ethiopian army base covertly supporting Sudan’s RSF