How UAE bases arming Sudan's RSF support US 'grey ops' in Somalia

Marco Rubio didn’t name the United Arab Emirates.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting of G7 foreign ministers held close to Niagara Falls, the US Secretary of State said his government knew who was supplying arms to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan and he said this support had to end.

“But the UAE is supplying them with drones, Chinese drones,” one reporter said.

“We know who the parties are that are involved,” Rubio replied.

“I can just tell you that at the highest levels of our government that case is being made and that pressure is being applied to the relevant parties,” he said.

“I don’t want to get into calling anybody out at a press conference because what we want is a good outcome. This needs to stop.”

Now, following lobbying from Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman first reported by Middle East Eye, US President Donald Trump has announced that “we’re going to start working on Sudan”.

Sources in Washington have told MEE that the State Department is considering a new round of sanctions targeting people crucial to the relationship between the Sudanese paramilitary group, which has in the last few weeks committed manifold atrocities in the city of el-Fasher, and the UAE, which has been its main sponsor.

These atrocities in el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, include mass rape and murder. The blood of those slaughtered can be seen pooled in the streets in satellite images. Civilians have been looted and held to ransom. Women have been abducted.

There are now around 650,000 civilians and over 300 foreign aid workers in Tawila, to the west of el-Fasher. International monitors have told MEE that these people are in grave danger, with an RSF checkpoint now established just 20km away.

The shock of the carnage in el-Fasher has brought renewed attention from governments and the public around the world to the role the UAE is playing in the war.

Abu Dhabi continues to deny supporting the RSF, but satellite imagery, weapons serial numbers, flight tracking data and dozens of sources inside and outside Sudan provide a weight of evidence to the contrary.

However, even while the US looks to rein in the UAE in Sudan, it is operating from Emirati bases crucial to the supply of the RSF.

Bosaso is a vibrant port town in Somalia’s semi-autonomous Puntland region, located on the southern coast of the Gulf of Aden on the crucial maritime route that runs down through the Suez Canal, the Red Sea and then out into the Indian Ocean via the Gulf of Aden.

It is described by one international traveller as “feeling a little bit Mediterranean”, with “lots of nice buildings and boats out in the ocean”.

It has also, for the last two years, become used to the thunderous sound of large cargo aeroplanes hitting the tarmac at Bosaso airport.

This airbase and the port of Bosaso have been developed by the UAE over the past few years and are now being used by the US to launch counter-terrorism operations against Islamic State fighters recently arrived in Somalia from Syria and other parts of the Middle East.

US sources briefed on the operations and officials in the Puntland administration told MEE that while the UAE has developed Bosaso as a staging post to supply the RSF in Sudan, the US is using it as a launchpad for missions inside Somalia.

On 10 November, just three days before Rubio condemned atrocities carried out by the RSF in el-Fasher and called for supplies to the paramilitary to cease, US Africa Command (Africom) conducted an air strike targeting Islamic State-Somalia close to Golgol Cave, just 32km southeast of Bosaso.

Since his inauguration, US President Donald Trump “has presided over an unprecedented escalation of the US counter-terrorism war in Somalia”, according to the New America think tank, carrying out 99 strikes this year, in comparison to the 51 undertaken by the Biden administration.

The strikes, many of which have been launched from US Navy warships in the region, are part of a massive offensive against Islamic State in Somalia since Trump took office by the Puntland Administration, with the support of the US and UAE.

Flight tracking data analysed by MEE also reveals a connection between Bosaso and official US bases in the region.

On 29 July, a US Marine Corps KC-130J Hercules aircraft with registration number 170283 flew from Camp Lemonnier in the neighbouring country of Djibouti to Bosaso, before continuing on to Mombasa and returning to Djibouti.

Lemonnier is the largest US military base in Africa, but with China and a host of other nations now also in possession of military bases in Djibouti, the US is keen to make use of other facilities, most noticeably Bosaso and Berbera, on the coast of Somaliland, another breakaway region of Somalia.

In September, a US military delegation led by Major General Claude Tudor, the head of Africom; Colonel Benjamin Benander, the head of US Special Operations in East Africa; and Larry Andre, the US ambassador in Somalia; met Puntland President Said Abdullahi Deni in Bosaso, as US special forces reportedly took part in a joint training exercise with Puntland security forces in the Cal Miskaad mountains.

“The UAE has offered the use of Bosaso as a staging area when US forces are going into Puntland or Somaliland,” Cameron Hudson, a former State Department official and CIA analyst, told MEE.

“It is not a permanent operation, but my understanding is that it has been made available and we have made use of it.”

Some of the strikes launched in Somalia are simply carried out by drones, but some are known as “sensitive site exploitation”, Hudson said, whereby US forces go into the targeted area after it has been hit to collect hard drives, DNA and other relevant intelligence.

Middle East Eye received no reply to requests for comment sent to the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the US Africa Command.

The UAE has “categorically rejected” evidence pointing to its support for the RSF, telling the Africa Report that an earlier MEE investigation into Abu Dhabi’s use of Bosaso was based on “fabrications”.  

Tactical and operational alliance

With Rubio looking to cut off supplies to the RSF and Trump responding to Mohammed bin Salman’s lobbying, tension between Washington, Riyadh and Abu Dhabi is clear.

“The US is now having to act as a referee between the UAE and Saudi Arabia, which they’ve never had to do,” Kholood Khair, a Sudanese analyst and director of the Confluence Advisory think tank, told MEE.

“The Trump administration is in with them both: it has political interests and security interests with the UAE relating to Israel, and it has economic interests, particularly personal economic interests related to the Trump family,” Khair said, referencing the rebuilding of Gaza, artificial intelligence and Jared Kushner’s investment deals, all of which relate to both the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

“In Bosaso, there is a tactical and operational alliance between the US and UAE,” Hudson said. “Ideological, as well, in terms of fighting radical Islam in the region. All of these are complicating factors when it comes to Sudan.”

Islamic State in Somalia formed as a splinter group of al-Shabaab in 2015 and was long considered a marginal operation. Indeed, it took two years for it to be recognised as an official IS associate.

But, according to Africa Confidential, it has transformed into a critical financial hub for IS groups across Africa, recruiting migrants from the Horn of Africa and facilitating flows of money to insurgents in Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

It has also set up an extortion system in Bosaso, and the wider Puntland region now houses more self-proclaimed jihadist fighters than almost anywhere else in the world.

The US, UAE and Puntland administration - as well as the Somali government in Mogadishu - are all battling the group.

“The glaring disagreement between the US and UAE is over Sudan, but that comes in the context of what appears to be a very tight and productive relationship.”

The US and UAE have common regional enemies in the form of Iran, the Houthis and militant groups such as IS and al-Qaeda. The UAE was the first Gulf state to sign the Abraham Accords with Israel and shares many joint military and intelligence projects with Israel and the US.

“There is a lot of discussion in Washington about whether the US will take a hard line with the UAE. Counter-terrorism is probably the number one American priority in Africa, maybe after minerals. The epicentre for the US on counter-terrorism is the Horn of Africa, not the Sahel,” Hudson said.

At Bosaso, this tension between diplomatic ambitions on Sudan and the US-UAE alliance is present on the ground.

“When you have warehouses of lethal equipment how does anyone differentiate between which stuff is going to the RSF and which stuff is being used for counter-terrorism targets,” Hudson asked.

“It’s genius by the UAE, because it is the perfect cover, mingling white ops with black ops. It all just becomes grey ops, and on and on it goes.”

Bosaso and Berbera, another Emirati base in Somalia, do not sit alone though. The UAE has built a ring of control around the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, constructing or developing a series of bases on territory held by its allies and clients over the last few years.

Satellite imagery analysed by MEE shows the presence of military-intelligence operations on Abd al-Kuri and Samhah, two islands that are part of the Socotra archipelago, which is now administered by Yemen’s Southern Transitional Council; Mocha in Yemen; and Mayun, a volcanic island in the Bab al-Mandab strait, through which 30 percent of the world’s oil is shipped.

Last month Associated Press reported on the emergence of a “mysterious airstrip” on Jabal Zuqar, a volcanic outcrop just off Yemen’s Red Sea coast.

“The UAE has been very eager to control the sea routes around the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea,” Amgad Fareid Eltayeb, director of Fikra, a Sudanese public policy organisation, told MEE.

“The UAE is implementing the same empire project of the British in the 19th century. This project depends mainly on creating instability and then controlling the sea ports, as the UAE did in Yemen with Aden.”

Apart from the Red Sea, Sudan offers abundant farmland and bountiful mineral resources. In 2024, 90 percent of Sudan’s official gold exports flowed to the UAE, which reported $53.4bn in gold export revenues.

The UAE’s bases have been developed in close cooperation with Israel and the US and have been used to monitor Houthi activity in the region, particularly after the Iran-aligned group began attacking commercial shipping vessels in solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza.

“The relationship between the UAE and Israel was very developed even before formal diplomatic relations were established [in 2020], but it was kept quiet. Not secret, just quiet,” Alon Pinkas, an Israeli diplomat who served as an adviser to four foreign ministers, told MEE.

'Air bridge' to Sudan

While the US uses Bosaso for counter-terrorism operations, flight tracking data analysed by MEE found that 77 flights had landed at the Puntland airbase between March 2024 and August 2025, showing that Bosaso has become a permanent part of the UAE’s “air bridge” to Sudan.

Last month, a senior manager at Bosaso’s port told MEE that, for the past two years, the UAE has funnelled more than 500,000 containers marked as hazardous through Bosaso.

The UAE has two bases inside Sudan itself, which has been at war since April 2023: Nyala in South Darfur and al-Malha, 200km from el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.

Exclusive: Inside the UAE's secret Sudan war operation at Somalia's Bosaso

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Now that the Sudanese paramilitaries have control of el-Fasher, they could look to fly cargo aircraft directly into the city, which has a large runway at its airport. This could result in less activity at Bosaso, but for now the Puntland base remains crucial.

Over the period monitored by MEE, a pair of transport planes appeared again and again: two IL-76s with registration numbers EX-76015 and EX-76019, operated by New Way Cargo Airlines, an airline based in the Kyrgyz Republic in Central Asia, landed 59 times in Bosaso, flying either from Ras Al Khaimah or al-Dhafra in the UAE.

Between 22 August and 24 August 2024, MEE tracked the EX-76015 aircraft making three round trips from Abu Dhabi to Bosaso. On each occasion, the cargo plane hid its signal during the flight, demonstrating the camouflaging technique used in Emirati operations of this kind.

A senior Puntland Maritime Police Force (PMPF) commander at Bosaso Airport described to MEE undisclosed heavy logistical materials being taken on and off the IL-76 cargo planes.

“They’re frequent and the logistics are transferred immediately to another aircraft that is on standby and is destined for the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in Sudan through the neighbouring countries,” he said.

“During loading and offloading they are heavily guarded as they carry sensitive materials and logistics that are not publicly disclosed,” said the commander, who also reported the presence of Colombian mercenaries at Bosaso.

In September 2024 and again in February 2025, according to Flightradar 24’s recorded data, EX-76015 made a direct flight from Abu Dhabi to Ethiopia. The same plane has been tracked flying from Bosaso to Aqaba in Jordan.Intelligence and tracking data shared with MEE by sources in the US shows that associates of Abdul Rahim Hamdan Dagalo, the brother of RSF chief Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti, have flown from Zalingei and Nyala in Darfur and been present in a location close to Bole international airport in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia. From there, they have taken private, non-commercial aircraft to Abu Dhabi.

Other planes, operated by Gelix Airlines and Sapsan Airlines, were tracked flying from Bosaso to al-Kufra or Benghazi, which are both under the control of eastern Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar, another ally of the UAE whose forces have worked with the UAE.

In June, witnesses told MEE that a host of mercenary groups connected to Haftar had fought alongside the RSF as it gained control of the Sudanese portion of the remote triangle region that includes parts of Libya and Egypt.

On several occasions, Flightradar24 tracking interruptions could be seen, particularly when the planes, including an IL-76 with the registration EX-76003, were approaching or leaving Libya. Some flights did not show a clear landing path, another pattern that suggests the use of “partially hidden” flights for non-commercial purposes.

Maritime network

Maritime routes connect the bases on the Yemeni islands of Socotra, Abd al-Kuri and Samhah - as well as Mocha on Yemen’s southern coast - with Bosaso and Berbera.

From August 2023 to August 2024, marine traffic data analysed by MEE showed that Al Mabroukah 2, an Emirati ship flying under the flag of Saint Kitts and Nevis, a country in the Caribbean, sailed from the UAE towards the Gulf of Aden, docking at Abd al-Kuri, Socotra island and then sailing on to Bosaso.

The visit to Bosaso coincided with the UAE strengthening its base there. Other ships, including the Takreem and the Yeam 1, have been tracked sailing between the UAE and its bases on the Yemeni islands in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea.

Apart from the planes and ships moving between them, the UAE’s bases all share similar operational structures: the runways, hangars and intelligence facilities all point to logistical and intelligence integration managed from a single regional operations room.

The UAE’s presence in Puntland and Somaliland appears to be part of a multi-pronged regional project, one that encompasses both the sea and air, and which extends from the islands of Yemen to the coasts of the Horn of Africa.

Satellite imagery taken between 2023 and 2025 shows Bosaso’s transformation, under Emirati management, into a fortified military centre. Over this two-year period, a host of key facilities have either been built or developed.

These include fortified ammunition depots, a dedicated cargo area for Il-76 cargo aircraft, radar systems, a field hospital, aircraft hangars and a French-made GM-403 radar system.

The GM-403 is a modern, portable radar capable of tracking more than a thousand airborne objects - encompassing drones, aircraft and missiles - over a range of more than 400km, which from Bosaso would stretch across the Gulf of Aden to parts of southern Yemen’s coastline.

Like Bosaso, Berbera is in a part of Somalia - in this case, Somaliland - that enjoys the patronage of the UAE and is looking to break away from Mogadishu.

In 2017, the self-declared republic of Somaliland agreed to allow the UAE to set up a military base at the port of Berbera, from which it could fight the Houthis as part of Yemen’s civil war.

Initially, there were reports that the UAE had cancelled its agreement with Somaliland, but recent satellite images reveal advanced infrastructure, including a modern military port, a deep-water dock and a dock capable of receiving large naval vessels.

This is complemented by a runway that extends for 4km, making it capable of receiving strategic transport aircraft such as the C-130 and IL-76, as well as fighter jets. These specifications enable long-range air operations, including troop transport, supply and potential attack sorties.

Berbera has previously been used as a staging post to send Sudanese fighters to Yemen. In March this year, Somaliland rejected an attempt by Somalia’s central government in Mogadishu to give the US exclusive control of the port and airbase at Berbera.

But at the end of July, Somaliland President Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi announced that he had changed his mind, saying his administration was prepared to host a US military base at Berbera and offer access to valuable mineral resources, including lithium, as part of a broader strategy to gain international recognition.

With concerns over China’s presence close to Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti, the US sees Berbera as an alternative strategic option to strengthen its presence in the Red Sea and Horn of Africa. There have also been reports that Somaliland is considering allowing the establishment of an Israeli base on its soil, again in exchange for recognition and investments.

“With nearly a third of global shipping passing through this corridor, threats from piracy, weapon smuggling, and terrorist groups like al-Shabab and the Houthis have drawn international concern,” Amit Yarom wrote in July for the Atlantic Council.

“For both Israel and the United States, Somaliland presents an opportunity for strategic collaboration.”

Saudi Arabia or UAE?

Now, with Trump’s announcement that he will turn his attention to Sudan, the stage is set for the intensification of a struggle for power that is already under way between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“Historically, Donald Trump has always been more impressed by, and more sympathetic toward, Saudi Arabia,” Jalel Harchaoui, an analyst focusing on North Africa and political economy, told MEE.

“By contrast, Washington’s complacency toward the UAE feels recent and contrived when set against the long tradition of US-Saudi closeness. The UAE is often seen as a capricious ‘nation-startup’, and now frequently perceived as the identical twin of Israel.”

For Harchaoui, Saudi Arabia’s position as the “top actor and funder for any reconstruction effort in Gaza” is crucial, as is Trump’s desire to “present himself as a president who solves ‘impossible’ conflicts”.

Sudan has a 750km coastline and sits just across the Red Sea from Saudi Arabia.

Amgad Fareid Eltayeb, who previously served as the assistant chief of staff in the Sudanese prime minister’s office, believes the UAE’s project in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden “is not compatible with security and stability and is directly threatening Saudi Arabia’s long-term plan for the post-oil era”. 

“The US is not choosing Sudan here. It is choosing which is its preferred ally, Saudi Arabia or the UAE?”

In a world of absolute rulers, from Trump to Mohammed bin Salman to the UAE’s Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, this means, in Hudson’s words, “elite bargains”.

“Tactically we cut deals the same way the Emirates cut deals. The UAE doesn’t have a big bureaucracy either. These are elite deals being cut by elites,” the former state department official said.

“The question in Washington today is: how do you get to Trump?”

For the moment, it seems that Sudan has got to the US president. “Tremendous atrocities are taking place in Sudan,” he wrote on his Truth Social media platform.

“It is considered a great civilisation and culture, unfortunately gone bad,” Trump said. “We will work with Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and other Middle Eastern partners to get these atrocities to end, while at the same time stabilising Sudan.”

As Trump posted, in Bosaso, another IL-76 appeared on the horizon, approached the runway and touched down. The sound of its engines echoed out across the city.

Main photo: US forces move ordinance on the deck of the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier ahead of an operation against Islamic State in Somalia in July 2025 (US Africa Command Public Affairs)