The killing of a powerful governor in Darfur, in western Sudan, has heightened worries that fighting between the country’s warring military factions is pushing a region blighted by genocide two decades ago into a new ethnic civil war. Since April, Sudan’s military has been battling the Rapid Support Forces, a well-armed paramilitary group that until recently was part of the national armed forces. The fighting has razed parts of the capital, Khartoum, and also engulfed Darfur. Peace talks led by American and Saudi diplomats have failed to broker a durable cease-fire. The United Nations mission to Sudan said in a statement that “compelling eyewitness accounts attribute this act to Arab militias and the Rapid Support Forces.”

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Persons: Khamis Abdullah Abakar, ” Organizations: Rapid Support Forces, American, United Nations Locations: Darfur, Sudan, Khartoum, Saudi, West Darfur