How a photographer escaped the besieged city of El Fasher

Last month, on the eve of fleeing his country, Sudanese photojournalist Mohammed Zakaria left his photographic equipment with a friend, not knowing whether he would ever see it again.

He was fleeing El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur state, which is in the midst of heavy fighting between Sudanese troops and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

Mohammed had been reporting for the BBC from this hotspot in Sudan’s 15-month civil war. But as the situation became increasingly desperate, he decided it was time to flee.

In May, the Rapid Security Forces escalated the siege of El Fasher, targeting the last military stronghold in Darfur.

Soon after, Mohammed’s house was hit by a shell, and another shell hit him as he was trying to take his injured neighbor to hospital. Five people died and 19 were injured – Mohammed still had shrapnel in his body, and his brother lost an eye.

Two weeks later, Mohamed watched his mother and three brothers leave for safety in neighboring Chad to the west, while he stayed behind to continue working and supporting them, he said.

But as Rapid Support Force fighters approached, civilians were trapped in the war zone subjected to indiscriminate shelling and army air strikes, and food supplies were cut off.

“I can’t move or work,” he said. “Now in El Fasher, you just stay at home and wait to die… Some residents have had to dig trenches in their homes.”

It was too dangerous to stay, and it was also too dangerous to escape. Finally he decided to go to South Sudan and finally to Uganda.

He believes the journey is safer than traveling to Chad to reunite with his family, and that he will be able to work once he arrives.

From El Fasher to South Sudan, Mohamed passed through 22 checkpoints, five of which were manned by the army and 17 by the Rapid Security Forces.

He was searched and sometimes interrogated, but he managed to conceal his identity as a photographer documenting the war. Except once.

The first stop was on 10 June at the Zamzam refugee camp on the outskirts of El Fasher.

Mohammed and his travel companion, his cousin Muzamil, stayed overnight at a friend’s house, where he hid his camera and other tools.

But he took with him valuable photo and video recordings — stored on memory cards and two external hard drives — as well as his laptop and mobile phone.

“The biggest problem I have on the road is how to hide them,” he said.

“Because these are dangerous things. If the Rapid Support Forces or any soldier sees them, you can’t explain it.”

On the first major leg of the trek, Mohammed hid them in a hole under the running board of a pickup truck without telling the driver.

He and Muzamil were stopped at a checkpoint by Sudanese soldiers who suspected they were entering Rapid Security Force territory to join the enemy, but otherwise they made it safely to Dar es Salaam, a town that marked the end of army control.

Here they joined other travelers and formed a convoy of six vehicles to the village of Khazan Jadid.

“We paid the RSF soldiers to come with us,” Mohammed said. “If you want to reach safety, you need to pay the RSF.”

The drivers collect money from the passengers and hand it over to them at the first checkpoint, where there is an RSF fighter in every vehicle.

At this point, Mohammed hid his memory card inside a piece of paper and placed it with other documents.

At the bus station in Hazan Jadid, Mohammed spotted only three vehicles.

“This road is very dangerous,” he said. “All the cars have stopped.”

However, they managed to catch a bus to the city of El Dayin, the capital of East Darfur State, and arrived there in the early afternoon of 12 June.

Mohammed said that at a checkpoint in the city center, those coming from El Fasher were put aside because they were suspected of collaborating with the army.

This is where he runs into trouble.

He deleted all the messages, photos and apps on his phone.

But the Rapid Support Forces officer discovered a Facebook account he had forgotten to delete, which contained posts he had shared about the bombing of El Fasher and the suffering of civilians.

Hours of interrogation followed, during which Mohammed was separated from Muzammil and accused of being a spy.

“They threatened me with torture or even death if I didn’t reveal the information I had,” he said.

“I feel so lost. It’s a very bad situation. If he wants to kill you, he can do it and no one will know. He can kill you, he can beat you, he can do anything to you.”

After paying a large sum of money, Mohammed was finally released at 7pm.

“It was the worst moment,” he said, recalling the experience. “Not only the worst moment of the trip, I think it was the worst moment of my life… because I didn’t see any hope. I couldn’t believe I was here.”

Mohammed suspected that his interrogators would notify another checkpoint along the way to arrest him again.

He and Muzamil rushed to the station to get out of town as quickly as possible. There was only one vehicle at the station, a pickup truck packed with people, but they managed to squeeze into a small space on the roof.

They reached the village of Abu Matariq, where the engine broke down and took two days to repair.

Mohammed, who survived the ordeal, was eager to reach South Sudan as soon as possible. But he encountered long delays.

On June 14, the travelers finally left Abu Matarek and headed for Raqabat, the last town before the East Darfur border, through the Deyim Forest, a flat expanse of grass and sand dotted with acacia trees.

Heavy rain slowed their progress and eventually stopped them because their pickup truck got stuck in the mud. They were trapped.

“This is a tough test,” Mohammed said.

“We were without drinking water and food for almost six days. We mainly depended on rainwater and dates.”

Fortunately, they bought two sheep from a shepherd who passed by.

Mohammed said he had no problems with food during his journey, as they passed through Rapid Support Force-controlled areas that saw fighting early in the war but have since stabilized.

Markets and small restaurants are still open. Food is expensive, but not “super expensive” like in El Fasher, where many people only have one meal a day.

In the forest, the men slept in the open air, sometimes in the rain, while the two women and two children in the team stayed in the car, walking barefoot in the mud and having to pick thorns out of their feet.

They finally got the pickup back on the ground, but the engine ran only sporadically due to a weak battery. Then the fuel ran out.

At this point, the two men set out to find the nearest village. The journey ended up taking nine hours. To everyone’s relief, they returned later that day with extra fuel and another vehicle.

Once in Raqabat, Mohamed and Muzammil only had to drive 15 minutes to safety in South Sudan.

But the next morning, before the travelers could set off, they were taken to the RSF headquarters office and interrogated for three hours.

There were reports that members of the Zaghawa community had entered the town, including Mohammed and a family that was traveling with him in a vehicle.

The Zaghawa are among the armed groups fighting alongside government forces in El Fasher, and the Rapid Security Forces consider them enemies.

Mohammed hid his memory card, hard drive and laptop in the hands of one of the women and told the RSF officers that he was a computer engineer.

Once again, everything depended on the reward: 30,000 Sudanese pounds ($50; £39) per person. Mohammed and several other members of the group paid an additional fee to release another man who was found to have a photo of an army soldier on his phone.

Mohammad and Muzammil then climbed into an auto-rickshaw and headed for the border.

Entering South Sudan on June 20 was an “incredible” moment for Mohammed.

“When I saw the South Sudanese, I thanked God and prayed,” he said. “I felt like I was alive. I really couldn’t believe I was alive and here. Despite my many encounters with the Rapid Support Forces, I arrived in South Sudan with all my data and my laptop.”

As soon as he bought a local SIM card, he called his mother. “She didn’t believe I was still alive,” he said.

Mohammed has not been connected to the internet for 11 days and his family has no idea where he is or what has happened to him during this time.

“They were very, very worried,” he said. “Most people told me, don’t ever try this, don’t do it, you’re not going to make it.”

But he succeeded.

He stayed in the South Sudanese city of Aweil for a few days, where the Zaghawa family, who were traveling with him, hosted him at their home.

He then traveled to the capital, Juba.

Muzamil decided to stay there, but Mohammed went to Uganda and registered as a refugee in a camp near the border because his passport had expired.

Twenty-three days after leaving El Fasher, Mohammed arrived in Kampala, the capital of Uganda, on July 3. He stayed at his uncle’s house.

“To be honest, I don’t know where life is going to take me from now on,” he said.

His priority is to take care of his family and reunite them. In addition to his mother and three brothers in Chad, he has a brother in Turkey and a sister in the United Arab Emirates.

His future dream is to return to Sudan during more peaceful times and establish a university in Darfur to teach filmmaking, photography and media studies.

“My work did not end after I left El Fasher,” he said. “I believe that was just one phase, and now I have begun to plan for the second phase, trying to convey the truth there.

“I hope that my efforts, even if only a little, can shorten the duration of the war and save the people of El Fasher.”