Sudan’s military leadership constructed a covert stockpile of chemical munitions and systematically concealed evidence of chlorine gas deployments against rival forces, according to an investigation published by The Washington Post.
The report, based on an extensive cache of internal videos, official documents, and intercepted digital messages provided by Middle Eastern security officials, details a clandestine weapons program operated by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). The leaked records indicate that the military diverted industrial chlorine cylinders intended for municipal water purification to assemble crude aerial bombs fitted with welded nose cones, stabilizing fins, and ball bearings designed to maximize casualties.
According to The Washington Post, the operation was directed by Tariq Madani, an SAF officer previously sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for defense procurement activities. Text exchanges and voice recordings in the cache show Madani discussing the production of hundreds of chlorine bombs at Merowe Air Base and evaluating enemy positions held by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) where toxic gas could flush out entrenched combatants. In one grim exchange detailed in the investigation, a video displaying a victim with charred skin was sent to an officer directing airstrikes alongside the message: “Your cooking.”
Footage vetted by digital forensic specialists and former chemical weapons inspectors shows test detonations in Sudan's desert, releasing high plumes of green-yellow vapor typical of chlorine. Leaked military files also describe specifications for four-foot “dual-effect” munitions engineered to scatter lethal fragmentation while dispersing toxic gas in a manner designed to obscure chemical traces from post-strike inspection.
Independent experts consulted by The Post, including former officials from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), characterized the materials as credible evidence of an active chemical program. Any deployment or stockpiling of chlorine weapons directly violates the 1999 Chemical Weapons Convention, of which Sudan is a signatory state.
The revelations add a grim dimension to Sudan’s three-year civil war between SAF commander Gen. Abdel-Fattah al-Burhan and RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, a conflict that has created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.
Sudanese officials, including Gen. al-Burhan, have repeatedly denied developing or using prohibited weapons. While the Sudanese military announced last year that an internal inquiry found no evidence of chemical contamination, leaked documents revealed that Madani himself was appointed to help steer the probe. Neither the Sudanese government nor the army responded to requests for comment.