Airstrikes Kill at Least 72 Artisanal Gold Miners Near Sudan-Egypt Border

Airstrikes on Saturday, October 10, 2026, killed at least 72 artisanal gold miners in a mountainous area near the Sudan-Egypt border, according to the Sudanese rights group Emergency Lawyers. The group said the attack took place at informal mining sites in the Jabal al-Uqaydat region and accused the Egyptian air force. Egypt's military and foreign ministry have not commented. Reuters and other outlets could not immediately verify the claim of responsibility.

Emergency Lawyers described the dead as civilian miners and said the toll was preliminary while verification continued. Images shared on social media and by local groups, not independently confirmed, showed bodies in rubble and wrapped in shrouds. Survivors told the Associated Press and other outlets that an aircraft struck the camps multiple times in the morning. One miner, Abdel-Aziz Yousef, said a jet appeared around 8 a.m. and struck five times. Another survivor, Sharaf Ali, said thousands of people worked at the remote site and that workers scattered after the strikes, making an exact count difficult.

This is the second such incident this year at the same area. Emergency Lawyers and other reports said airstrikes in June killed 23 workers. Cairo has previously faced accusations of strikes on gold prospectors as part of efforts against illegal mining and smuggling along the southern border. Egyptian authorities have in the past conducted operations against artisanal sites and warned workers to leave certain zones. The precise location sits in a disputed border region that includes the Halayeb triangle, claimed by both countries.

Northern Sudan has seen a surge of artisanal miners since the civil war between the army and the Rapid Support Forces began in April 2023. Gold has become a key cash source for both sides. Much of the production is smuggled, including into Egypt, according to sector experts. The war has killed hundreds of thousands and disrupted other livelihoods, pushing people into the high-risk mining camps.

The Sudan Doctors Network earlier reported at least 13 dead and 28 wounded in the Border Triangle Area and said the death toll was likely to rise because of limited access to medical care. Some accounts placed the strikes on the Egyptian side of the line; Emergency Lawyers placed them inside Sudanese territory. Neither government has issued a detailed public statement on Saturday's event.

Emergency Lawyers said a cross-border attack on unarmed civilians would violate international law and could constitute a war crime. The group noted previous alleged Egyptian actions in the region. Egypt is a key political ally of Sudan's army in the ongoing conflict, yet Cairo treats illegal mining, arms flows and border insecurity as security threats. The mining camps operate with minimal regulation and sit hours from formal medical facilities.

Survivors fled into the mountains or toward markets such as Al-Ansary. Local rights groups continued to collect accounts on Sunday. The combination of disputed borders, gold as wartime financing, and repeated strikes on the same sites has left the informal miners exposed. Whether the death toll climbs further depends on recovery of additional bodies and access for independent verification in a remote area where both governments have limited presence.