The Gold Rush Behind a Civil War

From the New York Times, I'm Rachel. Abrams and this is the Daily. >> What we're about to talk about [music]. next might be the most undercovered. story of human misery [music] on planet. Earth. >> 20 years ago, a genocidal campaign in. the Darur region of Sudan shocked the. world. Now, videos and [music] images of. new atrocities have captured global. attention once more. >> 150,000 people [music] have been killed. Some 12 million displaced, half of them.

children, >> as another bloody conflict has returned. [music] to the region. >> This week, the people of Alaser, >> beaten and threatened, fled for their. lives from a murderous militia [music]. that films itself unleashing ferocious. violence. >> Today, [music] my colleague Declan Walsh. on what has become the worst. humanitarian conflict in decades and the. precious [music] metal that is fueling. it. It's Monday, [music] November 10th,

Declan. In recent weeks, there have been. many horrific images coming out of. Sudan, including what appear to be these. very graphic execution videos, and this. is all occurring as part of a civil war. that you've been covering since the. start. Tell me what has happened in. Darur over the past couple of weeks. Well, after 18 months of a pretty brutal. siege led by this paramilitary group,

the Rapid Support Forces, which had been. trying to seize control of this city. called Alaser. It was the last major. urban center in western Sudan that was. beyond its control. It finally broke the. siege and its troops seized the entire. city. They expelled the Sudin military. from it. And what followed was really. days of reports of atrocities against. about a quarter million civilians who'd. been trapped inside the city.

>> First, we saw these videos start to come. out showing bodies piled in buildings, sometimes fighters executing wounded. people lying on the ground, often quite. casually. These videos, it must be said, are filmed by the fighters themselves as. kind of trophies for the war, which is a. pattern we've seen since the start of. the Sudan war. And since then, that's. been added to by accounts from. witnesses, from people who fled the. city, from aid groups, and now from.

open-source investigators who are using. satellite images to try and determine. what's been happening in Alaser. And. just last week, a new report from one of. those groups saying that they had. uncovered evidence [snorts] that 80. people had been killed in one specific. incident. Others have found traces, in. fact, from satellites of blood on the. sands of the area around Elasir. >> This is of course coming 20 years after. another bloody conflict made Darur.

basically a byword for human rights. atrocities. Can you talk to us about. what is different this time? That's right. I mean, 20 years ago, Darur in fact became synonymous with the. word genocide. And that's because at. that time, there was an armed militia. called the Janjid that was leading a lot. of the killing in Darur, a conflict that. killed as many as 300,000 people. The. difference this time is that the Janjeed. has been replaced by another group. called the rapid support forces,

effectively its descendant. And [snorts]. that group is better armed than ever. before. In the past, the Jedi fought. with horses and camels. This [snorts]. time the rapid support forces have got. armored vehicles, extremely. sophisticated Chinese drones. Last time. the Janjid River were fighting alongside. Sudan's army. This time it's fighting. against the army. And its ambitions are. no longer limited to control of Darur.

It's part of this struggle for control. of the entire country. Since the war. started over two years ago, at least 12. million people have been forced from. their homes in Sudan. As many as 400,000. have been killed by some estimates. And. [snorts] about half the country is. facing acute hunger with many instances. of declared famine, mostly in the same. region of Darur. And that's part of this. civil war that's been raging in Sudan. for the last 2 and 1/2 years. And that.

war has led to what is now widely. recognized as the world's largest. humanitarian crisis. >> These numbers are obviously staggering. You mentioned 400,000 people have been. killed and I want to talk about what is. driving this conflict which is something. that you have spent a lot of time trying. to report out and you're reporting one. of Pulitzer actually this year. Tell us about what you have learned. about why this conflict has gotten so. bloody.

>> Well, when it started in April 2023, it. looked quite simply like a power. struggle between two rival generals at. the top of Sudan's security forces. But. very quickly that conflict spread from. the capital cartoon across the country. engulfing Africa's third largest. country. And you know the next logical. question that stemmed from that for me. was how are they all funding it. >> right? >> So follow the money really became a. central part of our reporting.

>> and in part that's what brought me to. the cartoon earlier this year at a very. dramatic moment just as the city was. changing hands. >> And what did the capital look like at. that point after about I guess two years. of war? It was absolutely devastated. You know, previously, just to paint you. a brief picture, this was a very proud. city on the Nile. This is a country that. had significant oil resources, deep gold.

resources. It had a growing middle. class. And now much of the city had been. laid to waste. entire neighborhoods of homes that had. been looted, buildings destroyed, and in. particular the city center around the. presidential palace. The presidential. palace had become one of its biggest. battlegrounds. At one point, we climbed into a sniper. nest beside the Nile River and. overlooking that palace. And it was.

amazing to see how it had been. absolutely reduced to rubble by the. fighting. And it wasn't just that. the. entire city center. Many tall buildings. were also pocked with bullet marks and. have been turned into fighting. positions. It was really incredible to. see how an entire city could be reduced. to rubble by this 2 years of war. largely, it must be said, without being. seen by the outside world.

>> As the Sudin military pushed into new. areas, we followed them. and often came across residents who were. emerging from their homes kind of. stunned. >> I was frightened and run away. >> We talked to this one man who'd seen his. neighbor get gunned down by RSF. fighters. >> He heard the shooting came out from his. house. He wanted to know what is. happening. Saw the militia of a man. shooted him. He was shooted by cold.

blood. and others brought these stories. about abuse, about starvation, about. people being killed. >> At one point, we found ourselves at a. well that contained maybe a dozen. bodies, and we were told that these were. people who had been killed by fighters. at a nearby checkpoint and dumped there. >> What was it like to report in that kind. of environment? And what kind of clues. could you find to answer your question. about what is funding and fueling all of.

this destruction? Well, as we went through the city, we. found ourselves in the abandoned villas. of some of the RSF leaders. In one of. them in particular, there were fighters. lounging outside this empty swimming. pool. The house had an internal. elevator, you know, sort of markings of. wealth that were such a contrast with. the scenes we were seeing outside. And so, as we walked through this house, I also found this sheath of papers that. evidently had been abandoned by the Orus.

leaders as they left. And when we. examine them more closely, they turned. out to be corporate documents related to. gold mines run by the same armed group. in the south of the country. And this. was a really important clue into what. was funding a lot of the fighting. We already knew that, you know, Sudan. had a huge gold industry going back many. years, but it was very difficult to get. a sense of just how important it had. become to these groups that were.

fighting for control and how much it was. fueling the fight itself. And here was. this clue that really set us further. along this track of trying to uncover. what's really driving this destructive. war in Sudan. It seems unusual that a. war could be boiled down to something as. simple as gold. It does remind me of the. blood diamonds that fuel the conflict in. Sierra Leone, but I'm curious if you see. it this way. >> Well, look, you're absolutely right. There is a strong parallel between the.

issue of blood diamonds that were so. famous years ago from West Africa and. the importance of gold in this conflict. But, you know, Sudan's war is about many. things. The fight between these two. generals exposed this much deeper rift. in the country. Tensions that go back to. the genocide 20 years ago in Sudan that. were never really healed. And now. they've become mixed with ethnic. problems, political problems, and. focused inside this war that has. engulfed the whole country. But on top.

of that, this is a country with a lot of. rich agricultural land. It's got ports. on the Red Sea. It's a huge country. So. there are many reasons to fight over it, but gold is the one thing that is easy. to mine in the middle of the conflict. and that now of course is worth so much. money. Gold prices are higher than. they've ever been. >> Declan, can you talk a little bit about. the gold economy, how much it's worth, if we have any idea how the gold. actually moves, and whose hands actually.

touch it along the way? Well, look, most of it is smuggled, so. we don't know exactly, but it certainly. by most estimates is worth billions of. dollars every year. [snorts] And it's a. huge factor on both sides of the war, but particularly for the RSF. And the. leader of the group, his name is. Lieutenant General Muhammad Hamdan, widely known as Hemet, is a commander. who in many ways came to prominence as a. result of gold. Back in 2017, his forces. seized one of the largest gold mines in.

the country and that became a bedrock of. the expansion of his military forces but. also of this sort of business empire. that he built up that helped to make him. such a power broker in the country. >> How has this general HeD managed to both. fight a war and mine for gold at the. same time? Like how does that operation. work exactly? >> To be clear, his forces aren't mining. the gold themselves. He relies on this. enormous pool of people in Sudan who are.

willing to work in really terrible. conditions to get the gold out of the. ground. Very little of it in his areas. are extracted through what you might. think of as a classic industrial mine. with lots of heavy machinery and so on. What actually happens is you've got. thousands, sometimes tens of thousands. of people who are extracting this gold. in really rudimentary ways, hacking it. out of the ground, literally using. pickaxes, pulling the ore out of the.

ground. I've seen it firsthand myself. when I visited some gold mining. operations in Sudan a few years ago. And. then they run it through this very. rudimentary process to sift it using. some pretty simple machines. Then they. use mercury to help separate out the. gold. That's extremely dangerous for. people's health obviously. And then. eventually that gold is processed into. sort of semi-pure bars. And then the. tailings or the waste from that is. further processed again and they extract.

the rest of the gold from that. So. that's what's known as artisal gold. mining as opposed to industrial mining. which involves classically as we would. think of a large plant with you know. huge amounts of earth being moved. around. So in many ways the RSF and. General Hamdam have relied on the fact. that Sudan is such a poor country and. there are so many people who are. available to do this really tough work. to get that ore out of the ground and. process it into gold. [music].

Given what we know about how desperate. the situation has been in Sudan, how. poor people are, obviously there's been. a famine for many years, and how brutal. the RSF has been. Would you call it. forced labor? Is it slave labor? >> No, I I would call it desperate labor. These are people who are turning to gold. mining because frankly there's no other. source of income left. The war has. devastated the country's economy. uh. this is a country that has a lot of very. fertile land and had other sources of of.

income. So you've seen these areas that. are now almost entirely controlled by. RSF fighters sometimes with a pretty. brutal regime over these gold mines, but. people are flocking to it from across. the region because that's the only way. they can get money to feed themselves or. their families. But it's important to. say that the RSF isn't doing this alone. Before the war, it was working with. mercenaries from the Wagner Group.

That's the Russian private military. company that's become such powerful. force in this part of Africa. >> That's very closely tied to the Kremlin, right? >> Yeah. Very closely tied to the Kremlin. Um, now known in some other places as. Africa Corps, but in this part of the. world, they still call it Wagner. And so. Wagner was working with the RSF before. the war, helping to extract the gold. from some of these areas or to secure. the gold as they transported it out of. the country. A lot of it seems to have.

ended up ultimately in Moscow. And in. the war itself, our reporting indicated. that Wagner or the Russian mercenaries. have continued to work with the RSF in. parts of Darur, particularly in this. extremely remote area called Songo, where you've got dozens of these small. gold mines dotted around the terrain. where people are mining for gold, but. also there is a central location where. what they call the tailings, that's the.

the the sort of the waste from the. initial pass on the gold is processed. and that provides an entirely new. process for extracting gold that is. almost entirely in the hands of the RSF. and their Russian partners. >> So you've just laid out very. comprehensively one side of the. conflict. Tell us about how gold fuels. the other side of the conflict. >> Sudan's military is also deeply. dependent on gold. It's a somewhat. different structure on the other side of. the country. Over there in the eastern.

and northern Sudan, there are a handful. of these large industrial style mines. and in fact production of gold according. to the official figures has now ramped. up to the point where more gold is being. extracted over there than ever before. even during the relative peace before. the war started. So the military. controls or has a stake in several of. these huge mines and the military like. the OSF runs some of these mines in. association with foreign players.

including some Russian business people. >> So Russia in some ways is supporting and. potentially benefiting from both sides. of this conflict. >> Correct. >> Declan, you have both sides of this. conflict using gold to fund their war. efforts. Obviously any kind of commodity. needs a buyer. Who is purchasing all of. this gold? >> Well, we found that nearly all of this. gold which has funded so much of the. fighting and created so much misery and. destruction in the country goes to a.

single destination. And that's a country that has a deep. interest in the war and could be the. solution to ending it. [music]. >> [music]. >> We'll be right back. >> Declan, you mentioned that all of this. gold is going to a single destination.

Where is it going and how did you report. that out? >> It's really hard to trace gold. You. know, it can be melted down. It can be. mixed with gold from other places. it. doesn't have a sort of geological. signature in the same way as diamonds do. for instance. So I reached out to. contacts in countries all around Sudan. We went through flight records, company. files in an effort to pull the thread of. one single shipment of gold that was. coming out of the war zone and ending up.

in international markets. And that led. us to this instance of a single shipment. of about $25 million worth of gold that. was mined in Darur in the middle of the. war zone was smuggled out through South. Sudan neighboring country and that ended. up on this luxury jet which had been. chartered from an American company and. flown hundreds of miles across into the. Persian Gulf to the country of the.

United Arab Emirates which as it turns. out is where 90% of smuggled gold from. the continent of Africa ends up and. nearly all of Sudin gold is traded as. well. >> So okay, that's what it took to trace. just one shipment. How much money. overall are we talking about that's. flowing from Sudan to the UAE? >> We are talking about billions of dollars. in gold. A lot of it is undeclared. So, it's hard to know exactly how much, but. there was a study a few years ago by a.

Swiss group which found that in the. decade from 2012 to 2022, $15 billion worth of undeclared gold. from Africa had ended up in the UAE. And. certainly a decent proportion of that. would have come from Sudan. It's a part. of the UAE economy that often gets. obscured by the country's image which. tends to focus around its gleaming. skyscrapers or its place as a location.

for reality TV shows or a certain amount. of glamour. But you know the truth is. that since the Emirates was a poor. country u seven or eight decades ago, it. has had this gold industry and that gold. industry has increased in leaps and. bounds in recent years. Um, and a lot of. the gold that is traded there comes from. Africa and most of that gold, like the. gold that comes from Sudan, is smuggled. >> And what have the Emirates said about. their role in funding this conflict? >> Well, the Emirates staunchly denies that.

it supports either side in the conflict. and in fact says that its main goal in. Sudan is to work towards peace. But that. contrasts with what we found in our own. reporting and what's been said by. numerous other sources, including human. rights groups, uh, United Nations. investigators and even American. lawmakers who've had intelligence. briefings on this subject. And all of. that points to the Emirates supplying. weapons to the RSF. Our reporting even.

showed that some of this smuggling has. taken place under the flag of one of the. most respected symbols in humanitarian. aid, the Red Cresant and the Red Cross. And the Emirates have supplied drones, they've supplied mercenaries to help the. RSF. And they've also given political. support to the group. Last year, Hemet, the leader of the RSF, did a tour of. several African countries in which he. met prime ministers and presidents and.

attempted to sort of burnish his image. Um, and he did that on a Boeing jet. which had been supplied by the UAE. At. the same time, it turns out the Emirates. has an ownership stake in one of the. largest governmentcontrolled. industrialized gold mines in the. country. That's called the the Kush. mine. In other words, there's evidence. that the UAE is arming one side in the. war while funding the other. >> So, the UAE is hedging its bets here. We. haven't talked about the United States. and any role that the US might have in.

ending this war. So far, the US has been. deeply invested in ending the wars in. Ukraine and Gaza, but we have heard next. to nothing about anything that the US. intends to do visav Sudan. What has the. Trump administration said publicly about. this? Well, if I can pedal back just briefly. to the previous administration, the. Biden administration, there has. certainly been a lot of US concern among. some officials at least about what's. going on in Sudan. The Biden.

administration recognized that the. Emirates was a major factor in fueling. the war and privately put pressure on. the Emirates to try and stop that to. little effect. The Trump administration. initially didn't seem to be very. concerned with Sudan, but as things have. gotten worse in recent months, particularly as the siege of the city. Alaser we talked about earlier. intensified, the Trump administration. has suddenly become much more engaged in. Sudan. Since September, we've seen the. US bring together this diplomatic.

grouping which it calls the Quad and. that is diplomats from the US, from. Saudi Arabia, from the United Arab. Emirates and from Egypt. And they say. that they are working towards a. ceasefire in the country. It didn't lead. to much initially, but at least provides. a sort of framework for what it hopes. could at least stop the fighting and the. war for the first time in over 2 and 1/2. years. But given how much money is. flowing into the UAE in the form of gold. from Sudan and the fact that they won't.

even acknowledge that they have a role. in the conflict, what incentive would. the UAE have in trying to solve this? >> Well, this is part of the problem. I. mean, critics of this diplomatic. initiative say, "Here's the US trying to. bring peace to Sudan, but doing it. through these talks with countries that. are fueling either side in the war, particularly the UAE." And in fact, even. when the UAE signed an agreement as part. of the Quad in September denouncing. foreign funding in the war, it was.

continuing to support the RSF and didn't. seem to do anything to stop the terrible. scenes that we've seen in Alaser just. over the last couple of weeks. So, it's. really a very uncertain effort. But it. has to be said that as these images have. been coming out of Sudan showing these. atrocities, it is generating outrage and attention. around the world. And in fact, I've even. heard recently from very senior American. officials that President Trump himself.

hasn't spoken much about Sudan, but has. privately told officials how appalled he. was at some of the things he's been. seeing and asking what the United States. can do at this stage to try and stop it. >> This war in Sudan started in 2023 and it. has gotten so much less attention than. the war in Gaza, which also started at. the end of 2023. And we may now be. talking about Sudan because there is a. ceasefire, a fragile ceasefire, but a. ceasefire nonetheless in Gaza. And I.

wonder whether these two things are. related, that there is now room and. space and attention to devote to this. conflict in Sudan. Do you see it that. way? I mean, look, one of the most striking. things about this war in Sudan is just. how little attention it's had, despite. the immense destruction and human. suffering that it has brought.

But what's [music] changed recently, I. think, is that we're seeing these images. coming out as there have been in Gaza. that captured people's [music]. imaginations because they are so. horrified with what they've been seeing. But the question now is when those. [music] images do go away, whether. public attention or even global. attention will also Wayne and with. [snorts and music] it even the small. amount of momentum that exists now.

towards finding a solution to the war. [music]. >> Declan, thank you so much. >> Thank you, Rachel. >> [music]. [music]. >> We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today. After a procedural vote Sunday night in. the US [music] Senate, the federal. government appears poised to end its. record-breaking shutdown. The deal saw a. handful of members of the Democratic. caucus [music] join Republican senators. to advance a package of bills that would. fund the government through January. 30th. In addition, the deal would fund. programs related to agriculture, [music]. military construction, and legislative. programs for nearly a year. It would. also require the government to rehire.

federal workers who were laid [music]. off during the shutdown. The deal, which. Democratic leader Chuck Schumer did not. support, includes no guarantee on. extending [music] the health insurance. subsidies that have been at the center. of Democrats demands. The funding. package must now be fully debated. [music] and passed by the Senate and. approved by the House before the. government can reopen. [clears throat]. and two of the BBC's top officials. resigned [music] abruptly on Sunday. following a report suggesting that a. program made by the public service.

broadcaster had misleadingly edited a. speech by President Trump. The. resignation of the officials, the. [music] BBC's director general and its. chief executive officer for BBC News. came several days after the Daily. Telegraph published details of a leaked. internal memo which argued that a. documentary the broadcaster aired. [music] had juxtaposed comments by the. president in a way that made it appear. he'd explicitly encouraged the January. [music] 6th capital riot.

Today's [music] episode was produced by. Mooj Zadei, Nina Feldman, and Sydney. Harper with help from Jessica [music]. Chung, and Ricky Netski. It was edited. by Michael Benois with help from Chris. Hel. [music]. Contains original music by Marian Lozano. and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley. That's it for the daily. I'm Rachel. Abrams. See you tomorrow.