About the Incident

• Location of the Incident: Goro Market, Mayo area, southern Khartoum
• Impact Site: Goro Market at coordinates 15.488455, 32.535477
• Date: September 10, 2023 
• Time: Between 07:00 and 07:15 AM local Sudanese time
• Victims and Injured: Approximately 47 killed, including women and children (the Sudanese Archive confirmed the death of three civilians, including a woman and her daughter), in addition to injuries ranging between 60 and 160 people.
• Type of Incident: Bombing, likely by drone or warplane shells 
• Potential Perpetrators: Sudanese Armed Forces or Rapid Support Forces.

Content Warning

This investigation includes descriptions, images, and claims of violence, showing: Bloodstains, remains of victims' bodies, and pictures of the injured inside the hospital.     

Introduction

A popular market in the Mayo area of southern Khartoum was bombed on the morning of Sunday, September 10, 2023, between 07:00 and 07:15 AM local Sudanese time. Media sources claimed that the attack was carried out by drones belonging to the Sudanese government forces.

In a statement published on the day of the incident, the Preliminary Committee of the Sudanese Doctors’ Syndicate reported 43 fatalities and over 55 injuries, which were transferred to Bashair Teaching Hospital as a result of the aerial bombing on Goro Market in the South Belt area.

The South Belt Emergency Room estimated the number of deaths at 47, including a woman and her daughter (their deaths were confirmed by the Sudanese Archive), and reported more than 60 injuries due to a "drone strike on the market." The same emergency room also published exclusive photos, claiming they were from the incident site, along with a video showing craters they claimed were caused by the impacts.

Various media outlets, activists, and websites circulated videos and images reporting on the bombing of the Goro Market. These videos and images showed injured and deceased individuals at the Bashair Teaching Hospital, in addition to material damage in the market.

According to the control map published by Sudan War Monitor on September 19, 2023, the green color indicates areas under the control of the Sudanese Armed Forces, while the orange color indicates areas under the control of the Rapid Support Forces.

At the time of the attack on Goro Market, the army's presence in Khartoum was concentrated in the Armored Corps, the Ammunition Factory, and the General Command. The Sudanese Armed Forces did not have control over the southeastern and southwestern areas of the incident location.

Methodology

The Sudanese Archive conducted an investigation into the incident based on:

• Preserving, analyzing, and verifying 205 video clips, images, reports, and posts uploaded on social media that show the location of the incident, initial reports, deaths and injuries, alleged losses, and testimonies from eyewitnesses and relatives of victims.
• Confirming the impact site by matching prominent landmarks visible in the visual content with satellite images and initial reports of the incident.
• Analyzing shadows in the initial post-attack footage to assess the timing of the strikes.

This investigation was the culmination of multiple stages of analysis of the available sources, providing the team with information related to the date, timing, and location of the incident, potential victims, and potential perpetrators. For more information on the Sudanese Archive's research methodology, please visit our website.

Redacted Information

The Sudanese Archive derived the information and findings presented here from online content, open-source data, and analytical techniques. However, footage depicting - especially of deceased and injured children - bloodstains and body remains - claims and accountability, is highly sensitive, whether available to the public online or removed.

Therefore, the Sudanese Archive will not reproduce or republish these sensitive clips and will work in this investigation to modify the clips containing the content mentioned above and/or remove the links leading to them. 

To request access to the redacted sources and analysis, please send an email to requests@sudanesearchive.org 

About the Impact Location

The Al-Nasr (Mayo) neighborhood is located in the southern part of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum. It covers an area of approximately 40,000 square kilometers. The neighborhood was named "Mayo" after the government of General Jaafar Nimeiry, which was referred to as the "Mayo Government," coinciding with the month of May, the same month in which Jaafar Nimeiry's coup took place in 1969.
 

The origin of the Goro Market, which occupies a street and open spaces in the western part of the Al-Nasr (Mayo) neighborhood in southern Khartoum, dates back to the 1990s. This market specializes in selling clothes, shoes, children's toys, and mattresses. Most of its shops are made of straw and burlap, and the market is run by residents of the Mayo area.

Since the beginning of the war in Sudan, Goro Market has transformed into the sole market serving the southern Khartoum area. However, other claims suggest that it has turned into a market for selling stolen goods from nearby neighborhoods in Khartoum at low prices, and it is now referred to as "Daglo Market," named after the commander of the Rapid Support Forces.

People and social media pages claim that the Rapid Support Forces have imposed their control over the market. Soldiers roam the market declaring their allegiance to the Rapid Support Forces leader, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo. They allege that the market has become a forced recruitment camp for men, women, and children.

Accounts on social media claimed that the target of the bombing was a headquarters for the Rapid Support Forces, and that the market housed elements of the Rapid Support Forces. They also alleged it was the largest market for selling stolen goods in the South Belt. Additionally, other accounts claimed the market served as a camp for forced recruitment. Meanwhile, Manal Abakero said in an interview on Sudan Now program on DW Arabic from Germany that:

"As for the market, there is no military presence as I told you. The Rapid Support Forces come to the market to shop like other citizens, but there is no permanent military presence in the market. It's a market for all citizens in the South Belt." The image shows a moment of smoke rising from a location in Goro Market, with people in civilian clothes, vendors, stalls, and tents, as well as buses in the market.

The same image also shows destruction in a warehouse near the main square (blue square in the above image) in the Goro market at coordinates 15.488305, 32.534481. A review of Sentinel.hub satellite images indicates that this damage did not occur during the incident itself, with its first appearance noted on May 27, 2023, and absent from images on May 22, 2023.  

According to the descriptive information on Google Maps, the market opens daily from 4:00 AM to 5:00 PM.
On September 29, 2023, the Rapid Support Forces' Negative Phenomena Settlement Committee removed and burned an informal market in South Khartoum. Comparing it to videos from the Falcon account on TikTok suggests it was the Goro Market that was burning. This indicates that the market did not cease operation after the bombing on September 10, 2023.

What happened and when

The Goro Market in the Mayo area was reportedly bombed by a drone or military aircraft allegedly belonging to the Sudanese Army, between 07:00 and 07:15 on Sunday, September 10, 2023. This resulted in the deaths and injuries of dozens of people, as well as the destruction of shops and properties.

The First Reports

The first reports of the attack came in a post accompanied by photos of victims and injured individuals at the Bashair Teaching Hospital's emergency room in South Belt at 08:02 AM on Sunday, September 10, 2023. The timing of the attack was stated to be around 07:15 AM, and it was claimed that the bombing on Goro Market was carried out by "warplanes." An initial estimate cited 11 deaths and dozens injured.

At the same time, an activist’s Facebook account published a post in which she said, “The Goro Mayo market is bleeding.” And about thirty minutes later, at 8:31 AM on the same day, an account on the X platform posted a tweet talking about a "new massacre in the Goro market," and shared preliminary statistics about the number of dead and injured who arrived at Bashair Hospital.

At exactly 8:33 AM, the South Belt Emergency Room posted an urgent call on its Facebook page for all available medical staff, paramedics, and blood donors to come to Bashair Hospital after reporting an increase in the number of victims and injured in the "airstrike on Goro Market.”

Reports continued to come in from the South Belt Emergency Room, which posted a video at 8:51 a.m. showing what they claimed to be the dead in the mortuary of Bashair Hospital. They also issued another urgent call for medical staff and volunteers to come and assist the injured and donate blood, along with posts counting the number of dead and injured who had arrived at the hospital.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which runs Bashair Teaching Hospital, claimed in a tweet on their X account at 12:21 p.m. that "the bombing of the Goro market happened at seven in the morning, the time when mothers and fathers shop for food for their families."

The Preparatory Committee of the Sudanese Doctors Syndicate published a statement at 3:14 p.m. on the same day about the airstrike on the Goro market, specifying the timing as early morning and providing the number of dead and injured. It should be noted that dawn time in Sudan on the same day was at 4:20 a.m.

The first videos about the incident were published by the South Belt Emergency Room, showing what is claimed to be the impact sites. The video narrator says: 
 "Here is the Dana shop that was hit, and here is one grave according to eyewitnesses who said it was torn apart and they buried it on the spot. This is the building next to the Dana shop that was struck, and this is the place where it was hit. This is the location, and this is the market. The shop here was targeted. The bombardment was in two phases, one here and one there. This is the bombing site," along with images of several casualties from the incident.

Using the Shadow Calculator tool and comparing it with an image (we identified its location by matching the prominent landmarks at coordinates 15.490118, 32.537169) posted on Facebook on the day of the incident showing smoke rising from the impact site, the visible shadows match the position of the sun between 07:00 and 07:15 local time on the morning of September 10, 2023.

Based on the analysis of the initial posts on social media, news reports, video clips, and photographs, along with the position of the sun and shadows using the Shadow Calculator tool, it can be inferred that the bombing of the Goro market likely occurred between 7:00 AM and 7:15 AM local time on the morning of September 10.

Specifying location

An image captured by the Sudanese Archive from ESRI | World Imagery Wayback shows the extent of the Goro market along the main streets and adjacent squares.  

Additionally, photos published by the South Belt Emergency page on their Facebook account showed the impact points and the damaged building.

 

The Sudanese Archive identified prominent landmarks visible in the video and photos of Goro Market after the bombing using an image from ESRI | World Imagery Wayback for the impact site at coordinates 15.488455, 32.535477.
 

Moreover, an image from Facebook on September 10, 2023, shows rising smoke and people fleeing the location, which the account owner claimed to be "Goro market during the bombing."

 The prominent landmarks in the image match the coordinates of the impact site in the previous video, confirming that it was taken shortly after the bombing in Goro market.

The video posted by the South Belt Emergency Room on its Facebook page shows two craters on the ground claimed by the video's photographer to be caused by the bombing that hit the area. The Sudanese Archive has confirmed at least one of them, in addition to damage to a building from shrapnel that the Sudanese Archive suspects did not originate from the same strike.
 

The videographer says, “The bombing took place in two stages.” The two sites are approximately 50 to 60 meters apart from each other. The videographer points out in the video the presence of the grave of an unidentified person who claimed that he was “killed in the bombing, his body parts were scattered, and he was buried in his place.”

The Sudanese Archive denies that the first hole visible at 00:21 of the South Belt emergency room video is from the same incident, according to the following:
 

The Sudanese Archive determined the location of the first hole in the video by matching prominent landmarks with a Google Earth satellite image at coordinates 15.488471, 32.535478.

 

• An image taken via the ESRI satellite shows | World Imagery Wayback on January 15, 2024. The first crater is in almost the same place and shape.
   

The second hole appears at 01:12 seconds of the South Belt Emergency Room video on Facebook. The same hole also appears in a video published three days after the incident, and in a photo posted by journalist Ebrahim Basit Nugdalla on Facebook.

To determine the location of the hole, the Sudanese Archive created a panoramic image from a video showing the entire hole and the dust scattered around it.
 

By comparing images of the crater and the prominent landmarks visible in its surroundings in the two videos and the photo with an image from Google Earth, the Sudanese Archive determined its location at coordinates 15.488918, 32.535666.
 

Victims of the attack

“It was a day full of terror. For hours, dozens of bodies remained lying under blankets in the hospital courtyard until their families came to identify their missing loved ones. Meanwhile, our staff did their best to save the lives of the survivors, whose wounds were testimony to the incredible power of the weapons used: Parts of their bodies were torn apart, and their stomachs were cut open,” says Mary Burton, emergency coordinator for Doctors Without Borders in Khartoum, describing what happened in the attack on Goro market during the emergency response inside Bashair  Hospital as a “massacre.”

An MSF paramedic at Bashair Teaching Hospital in Khartoum, Loretta Charles, who treated people with penetrating injuries, told the BBC: “We were subjected to painful amputations and penetrating injuries to the chest, abdomen and head.”

The South Belt Emergency Room published pictures that it said were of injured people in Bashair Hospital. A video also showed interviews with a number of wounded people who confirmed their injuries in the bombing of Goro Market, where most of the visible injuries were concentrated in the hands and feet.

A Sudanese activist, citing Mohammad Kandasha, spokesperson for the Southern Belt Emergency Room, claimed that the injured were transported via "tuk-tuks and kawaros (animal-drawn carts)," which exacerbated their injuries, with a significant number of fatalities occurring during rescue operations.

Accounts on platforms like X and Facebook circulated information about casualty figures, including civilians, and shared images of response operations inside Bashair Hospital. These depicted individuals claiming to have been injured in the alleged bombing of a market, which social media accounts alleged was a center for selling stolen goods. Other accounts classified the market as a center for the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), while some denied any military presence in the market.
The casualty figures and the number of injured in the bombing of Goro Market were conflicting. Médecins Sans Frontières and the Preparatory Committee of the Sudan Doctors Union estimated the death toll at 43 people.
However, the South Belt Emergency Room on Monday, September 11, 2023, estimated the number of victims at 47, including severe injuries, which aligned with a report from the Ayin Network reporting 60 people receiving treatment at Bashair Teaching Hospital, consistent with Médecins Sans Frontières' statistics. A Facebook post claimed 46 fatalities and dozens injured. The following day, a comment in a group stated that the number of injured had risen to over 160, all civilians except for one military personnel injured in the thigh. It was reported that 47 casualties had arrived at Bashair Hospital, but 12 bodies had not yet been brought to the hospital.

The Sudanese Archive could not verify the exact number of fatalities, but the South Belt Emergency Room mentioned in a post on Monday, September 11, 2023, that there were 12 unidentified bodies whose relatives had not come to claim them. These individuals did not have identification documents proving their deaths were due to the bombing of Goro Market, and they were to be buried in Anqola graves. Images from news sites and the South Belt Emergency Room showed the burial of victims' bodies.

A screenshot of a post by the South Belt Emergency Room, taken by the Sudanese Archive on March 18, 2024.
 

A video posted by the Emergency Room of South Belt claimed to show the bodies of victims of the bombing of Goro Market, transferred to the mortuary of Bashair Hospital, with 18 bodies wrapped in white shrouds except for one body wrapped in a blanket within the hospital.
Another video posted by the room showed what the photographer claimed to be "a grave of a person who was killed in the bombing of Goro Market, with his remains collected and buried on site.”

Accounts on social media claimed that the casualties in the attack were from the Rapid Support Forces, while other accounts asserted that the majority of the wounded and killed were civilians.

The Sudanese Archive did not find a list of names of the casualties in the attack on Goro Market. However, confirmed reports through posts on social media and by relatives of the victims confirm the deaths of Mrs. Halima Hassan Baqari and her daughter Lamia Hamed Ibrahim in the market bombing.

 

The South Belt Emergency Room also posted two announcements, one showing an ID card claimed to have been found on one of the victims named (Mousa Mohammed Ahmed Abdulrahman), and the other showing a passport of a victim named (Ahmed Al-Zubair Mohammed), requesting their families to come to the hospital to claim their bodies.

And at the bottom of a board that reads "South Belt Emergency Room, Deaths Today 10/09/2023," there is a collection of photos claimed to be of the victims of the attack on the Goro Market. Among the 25 photos are three showing Hamida Baghari, her daughter Lamia, and Mousa Mohammed Ahmed Abdulrahman.

Accounts also claimed that the field commander of the Rapid Support Forces, "Al-Daw Bashari," was severely injured, and a group of his companions were killed in the attack.

A comment accompanying a video on a post shows an injured person wearing military clothing similar to that of the Rapid Support Forces. The Sudanese Archive was unable to determine the identity of the person in the video or the time and place of its recording.
Based on the detailed information above, the Sudanese Archive confirms the death of three people, including a woman and her child, in the attack on Goro Market. Additionally, it confirms the presence of 18 bodies in the Bashair Hospital morgue, along with several injuries. 

Destruction

Photos posted on Facebook show fires and destruction in the market stalls, as well as shrapnel, blood stains, and human remains on the walls made of sackcloth and zinc in the area.

A collection of photos posted on Facebook shows the aftermath of the destruction, fires, shrapnel, and blood in the Goro Market. They were taken by the Sudanese Archive on May 3, 2024.

Videos and photos also show bloodstains, broken chairs, burnt trees, and shrapnel on the walls of a building in Goro Market after it was attacked.

The Sudanese Archive suspects that the circulated images depicting a building damaged by shrapnel from shelling are inaccurate for the following reasons: 

• The Sudanese Archive refutes, in the geographic location section, the claim made by a video photographer from the South Belt Emergency Room that the crater visible at 00:21 and facing the damaged building is from the same shelling, as it appears in satellite images before the incident..
• A water pipe emerging from one of the craters indicates that it was dug manually.
• Similar openings exist on the opposite end of the seemingly abandoned building.

In a video from the South Belt Emergency Room, at minute 01:13, a crater is shown which the speaker attributed to the bombing. The crater is more clearly visible in another video posted by the Sudanese Arabic page on Facebook.

Weapon Used

Multiple sources, including Ghandour and Moeas Mergani Baket, reported that the bombing was carried out by a drone or a MiG warplane.
According to a video posted on Facebook, one witness said, "The airplane came, hit, stood on the southern side, then moved to the northern side, and we saw it with our own eyes. It stood while we moved away, and continuously came and hit, without the final sound of a Sukhoi or a small plane, behaving like a thread." Another witness in the same video said, "The MiG struck and killed a lot of people.”

The Sudanese Archive was unable to definitively determine whether the bombing of Goro Market was carried out by artillery shells or aerial munitions from a drone or warplane, due to the lack of visual content in available online sources showing the moment of bombing or shrapnel at the site. Nevertheless, eyewitness accounts and reports from news channels suggest that the bombing may have been carried out by a drone.

Potential responsible party

Responsibility for the incident has been a subject of contention between the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese government forces. In a statement, the Rapid Support Forces accused the Sudanese government forces of being responsible for an airstrike that hit Goro Market, resulting in casualties, injuries, and destruction in the market.
 

Newspapers, news websites, activists, and 'Emergency Lawyers' also held the Sudanese Army responsible for the bombing of Goro Market. Claims varied, alleging that the bombing was carried out by military aircraft or drones. Eyewitnesses in a video, which we couldn't verify, stated that 'a silent Sukhoi aircraft, drone, or MiG aircraft bombed the market.” Claims varied, alleging that the bombing was carried out by military aircraft or drones. Eyewitnesses in a video, which we couldn't verify, stated that 'a silent Sukhoi aircraft, drone, or MiG aircraft bombed the market.

The Sudanese Ministry of Defense denied responsibility for the incident in a statement, accusing the Rapid Support Forces of the bombing. The Ministry specified that the Rapid Support Forces struck Goro Market using drones and artillery while falsely accusing the armed forces.

Based on detailed information in the section on the weapon used, allegations, witness statements, and news sources, it is believed that the attack was carried out by unmanned aerial vehicles or military aircraft allegedly sourced from Sudanese government forces. 

Condemnations

Médecins Sans Frontières condemned the violence against civilians and the use of weapons in residential areas in a report, urging all parties involved to cease using explosive weapons with wide-ranging effects, given the potential high concentration of civilians.
 Clementine Nkweta-Salami, Deputy Head of the UNITAMS mission, also condemned the indiscriminate attacks on residential areas in Khartoum, describing them as completely unacceptable and in violation of international humanitarian law.
 

The bombardment that hit Goro Market was described by the Democratic Front for Lawyers as a "War Crime." This condemnation was echoed by the Sudan Doctors' Syndicate Preliminary Committee, Emergency Lawyers, the Interim Committee of the Sudanese Lawyers' Syndicate, and the Sudanese Rural Women's Alliance.

Conclusion

Based on the detailed information above, it is likely that a drone strike hit Goro Market in the Mayo area south of Khartoum between 7:00 and 7:15 AM local time on Sunday, September 10, 2023.

The bombardment resulted in the deaths and injuries of civilians in the market, including women and children. The Sudanese Archive was able to verify the identities of four victims, including a mother and her daughter, who were killed in the attack, in addition to significant damage to the location.

Due to limited available information, the Sudanese Archive could not definitively determine the type of weapon used or the responsible party. However, allegations and witness statements suggest that the attack on the market was carried out by drones or military aircraft believed to be affiliated with Sudanese government forces.