Middle East Eye says a confidential UN panel update ties Abu Dhabi to Colombian fighters at el-Fasher
The report is marked strictly confidential and will not be released. The UAE says it rejects any allegation of wrongdoing. One outlet has seen the text.
Middle East Eye reported on 6 November that it had seen the fourth quarterly update of the UN Panel of Experts on Sudan, and that the document “establishes conclusively” that the United Arab Emirates hired Colombian mercenaries to fight for the RSF. Per MEE’s account, the fighters were “trained and deployed through a network of facilities and transit routes involving the UAE, Somalia, eastern Libya and Chad,” played “a significant role” in Darfur operations “particularly in the siege and capture of el-Fasher,” and provided “combat and technical support, including drone operation, artillery and infantry support.” MEE says the document identifies the UAE-linked Puntland Maritime Police Force base at Bosaso as a transit or training site. A UAE letter annexed to the report states that Abu Dhabi “rejects any allegations of wrongdoing in relation to the Sudan conflict” and “takes allegations about mercenaries very seriously.”
MEE further reports that a separate annual report making similar assertions has been blocked for months by Bahrain, a non-permanent Security Council member and close UAE ally, and that after investigators briefed the Council in July the Emirati ambassador demanded they “immediately remedy the serious defects” in the report. Addis Standard and Kenya’s Eastleigh Voice carried versions; both are derivative of MEE rather than independent confirmation. The Addis Standard account links the leak to the UAE’s nomination of Lana Nusseibeh for UN Secretary-General, noting she was challenged over previous denials of UN findings at an interactive dialogue with member states on 27 October.
Assessment: The underlying allegation is not new — Human Rights Watch published 83 pages on Abu Dhabi-based GSSG and Colombian recruitment on 25 May, and a July UN experts' report placed Colombian fighters at a Nyala base from March 2025. What is new is a confidential text, read by one partisan-contested outlet, at the moment an Emirati diplomat is campaigning for the Secretary-Generalship. Both things can be true: the findings may be solid and the timing of the leak may still be a weapon. Until the document or an independent read of it surfaces, this is sourcing worth attributing by name in every sentence — and the blocked annual report is the detail to watch, because procedural obstruction is verifiable where the annex is not.