The International Crisis Group posted on 1 October 2026 a 58-minute podcast titled "Inside Sudan's War" with Alan Boswell and Sudanese national Yousra Elbagir, Sky News Africa correspondent.
The podcast draws on Yousra Elbagir's visits to Port Sudan, ransacked family home in Khartoum, road trip from Khartoum to El Obeid following a sustained aerial attack on the city, and other locations in Sudan. Some of her insights involved the personal impact of the war on her reporting.
Russia has long been rumored to have obtained agreement from Sudanese authorities to establish a naval base in Port Sudan. During an escorted visit to the Sudan Navy's base in Port Sudan, she saw no evidence of a Russian presence but understood that Russian military personnel had been at the facility in recent years. She also learned that Saudi Arabia strongly opposes any foreign naval base in the Red Sea, whether by Russia, Turkey, Iran or any other country. Saudi Arabia has considerable influence over the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) that controls Port Sudan.
There have been recent rumors of SAF cooperation with the rebel Houthis in Yemen. She neither saw nor heard any evidence of such cooperation, which would also be strongly opposed by Saudi Arabia and is effectively at war with the Houthis.
When asked about an end to the war between the SAF and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), she commented that the RSF is eroding internally. Consequently, it is possible the RSF may choose to negotiate with the SAF. But the SAF has no plan to achieve a lasting peace. Both sides increasingly realize that they cannot fight forever. In the meantime, the Sudanese people see themselves as pawns at the mercy of the SAF and RSF.
