Explosions were heard Friday morning near the army-held Sudanese capital Khartoum, witnesses told AFP, a day after paramilitaries announced their agreement to a humanitarian truce.

Residents of the nearby city of Omdurman reported that the explosions occurred near a military base and a power plant, causing power outages. Other witnesses in Atbara, 300 kilometers further north, reported seeing drones targeted by air defense systems.

After capturing the town of El-Facher in western Sudan on October 26, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitaries, who have been at war with the regular army since April 2023, appear to be directing their offensive towards the Kordofan region in the center of the country, and Khartoum further east.

The capital has enjoyed relative calm since the army regained control in March, but drone attacks by the FSR have continued against military and civilian sites.

An Omdurman resident told AFP, on condition of anonymity for fear of his safety, that he was "awakened around 2:00 am by the sound of anti-aircraft fire, followed by explosions near the Wadi Sayidna military base".

Another resident in the northwest of the city said he "heard a drone in the sky around 4:00 a.m., before an explosion" that occurred near a power plant, which caused a power outage.

In Atbara, a city in the north of the country controlled by the army, a resident said that several drones "appeared over the city shortly after 03:00".

"Air defenses shot them down, but I saw fires start and heard explosions in the east of the city," testified the man, who also refused to give his name.

"I saw ten drones over the city and the air defenses were shooting them down one by one," said another resident of Atbara.

No casualties have been reported. Neither the army nor RSF have commented on the attacks.

- A bombed hospital -

The Sudanese doctors' union also claimed that paramilitaries had bombed a hospital in the city of Dilling, in South Kordofan, on Thursday morning, injuring several people.

The bombing "destroyed the hospital's radiology and imaging department," the union said.

The paramilitaries announced on Thursday that they had agreed to a humanitarian truce proposal presented in September by the mediating countries.

This proposal from the so-called Quad group, which includes Saudi Arabia, the United States, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates, stipulates a three-month humanitarian truce, a senior Saudi official told AFP on Thursday. He added that efforts would be made during this period to bring the two sides together in Saudi Arabia for negotiations on a permanent peace agreement.

The FSR, led by General Mohamed Daglo, announced on Thursday "their agreement to engage in the humanitarian truce" proposed by the Quad.

The army has not commented on this announcement. But its chief, General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, reiterated on Thursday that his forces were continuing "to defeat the enemy."

The war pits General Burhan, the country's de facto leader since a 2021 coup, against General Daglo, his former deputy turned enemy. In two and a half years, the conflict has claimed tens of thousands of lives, displaced nearly 12 million people, and triggered what the UN considers the world's most serious humanitarian crisis.

Since the capture of El-Facher, the last stronghold then held by the army in the vast Darfur region, the UN has reported massacres, rapes, looting and massive population displacements.

Access for the delivery of humanitarian aid has been virtually impossible for months in Darfur and neighboring Kordofan, the two regions most affected by the war.