Sudan's Attorney General, Mawlana Intisar Ahmed Abdel Aal, delivered a recorded statement at the 15th United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in Abu Dhabi, criticizing the UAE's role in the conflict in Sudan. The congress, which took place from September 26 to 30, 2026, brought together delegations from over 97 countries, 93 expert speakers, and roughly 200 side meetings. Abdel Aal's statement, translated from Arabic, accused the UAE of providing weapons, money, and political support to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary group fighting the Sudanese army.
The UAE has spent a decade building its international reputation as a responsible and rules-respecting power. However, Abdel Aal's address challenged this image, framing the conflict in Sudan as an external aggression rather than an internal conflict. She argued that the UAE's hosting of the congress on crime prevention was an affront to the forum's founding purpose, given its alleged support for the RSF. Abdel Aal called on the international community to strengthen the criminal justice system and ensure accountability for the war in Sudan.
This is not the first time Sudan has accused the UAE of involvement in the conflict. In April 2025, Khartoum accused the UAE at the International Court of Justice of complicity in genocide against the Masalit people of Darfur. Although the World Court dismissed the case on jurisdictional grounds, the judges made clear they were taking no position on the merits of Sudan's claims. Sudan's foreign ministry responded by stating that dismissal on a technicality was not exoneration.
Independent investigations have continued to build on Sudan's allegations. Reporting in 2026 has revealed a logistics and training network run through eastern Libya, and cargo routes through Chad and Ethiopia, sustaining the RSF's war effort with UAE-linked supply chains. In June, a coalition of human rights organizations filed a submission with the International Criminal Court naming senior UAE and regional officials in connection with alleged atrocities in Darfur.
The UAE has consistently and categorically denied every element of Sudan's account, dismissing the allegations as politically motivated attempts to deflect from the conduct of Sudan's own army. When the ICJ threw out the genocide case, a senior UAE foreign ministry official called it proof that the suit was "utterly baseless." The UAE's own opening remarks at the Abu Dhabi Congress made no mention of Sudan, instead focusing on the country's judicial development and commitment to international cooperation on crime and justice.
Abdel Aal's intervention at the congress highlighted the optics problem facing the UAE. A gathering convened to project the UAE's credentials as a guardian of the rule of law instead carried a recorded address naming the host as a party to the very kind of impunity the gathering exists to prevent. Sudan did not need to storm the podium; it needed only to accept the microphone it was handed and use it.
The impact of Abdel Aal's address on the UAE remains to be seen. While jurisdictional walls, denials, and the absence of a binding international finding of fact have kept Abu Dhabi's culpability formally unresolved, the documentary record supporting Sudan's account continues to accumulate. The incident has raised questions about the UAE's role in the conflict in Sudan and its ability to host international forums on crime and justice.
Key points
- Sudan's Attorney General accused the UAE of sponsoring the war in Sudan at a UN congress in Abu Dhabi.
- The UAE has denied every element of Sudan's account, dismissing the allegations as politically motivated.
- The incident has raised questions about the UAE's role in the conflict in Sudan and its ability to host international forums on crime and justice.
