A closed-door Sudan-focused gathering organized by the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office at the Wilton Park conference facility has sparked sharp international criticism after independent outlet Middle East Eye exposed that a senior leader from the political wing of Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) will attend the event – while the country’s internationally recognized army-backed transitional government has been excluded from the agenda.
Multiple verified British and Sudanese sources confirm that Nasredeen Abdulbari, a top figure in the RSF-aligned Tasis political coalition, will participate in the three-day conference, which kicked off Wednesday, alongside an official delegation from the United Arab Emirates. Sources familiar with the event’s planning describe the gathering as intentionally kept “discreet,” with no public listing on Wilton Park’s official event schedule, a departure from the facility’s standard transparency practices for most of its dialogues.
The controversial invitation to the RSF representative and UAE delegates follows damning recent testimony to a UK parliamentary committee from Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab. Raymond publicly accused the UK government of prioritizing its close strategic and economic ties with the UAE over taking meaningful action to halt widespread atrocities in Sudan’s ongoing civil conflict.
Sudan has been locked in a brutal civil war since April 2023, pitting the RSF paramilitary group against the country’s formal Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). The RSF, which the United Nations, United States and multiple independent human rights bodies have formally accused of perpetrating genocide in Sudan’s Darfur region, has long been documented receiving military and political backing from the UAE – a claim the UAE has repeatedly denied despite growing open source evidence. The SAF, by contrast, receives external support from Egypt and Turkey.
In a striking contradiction of the UK’s public posture on the Sudan conflict, British officials joined a joint statement with other European nations in June 2024 that openly condemned RSF atrocities, specifically referencing the group’s October 2023 seizure of el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur. The statement noted that UN assessments found the violence carried out during that assault carried “the hallmarks of genocide,” with witness accounts collected by Middle East Eye confirming systemic rape, summary executions, and extortion of civilian populations by RSF fighters.
Beyond Abdulbari and the UAE delegation, Wilton Park officials have confirmed that representatives from several other Gulf states will also take part in the closed conference. Founded in the aftermath of World War II to foster open democratic dialogue between global stakeholders, Wilton Park brands itself as the UK’s “foremost multilateral facilitator” and acts as an official expert body for the UK government to convene sensitive international policy discussions.
When reached by Middle East Eye for clarification on attendee lists and the purpose of the confidential gathering, the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office declined to issue any comment. A senior foreign office source, speaking on condition of anonymity, only confirmed that the event was proceeding as planned, and a Wilton Park staff member also verified that the conference was scheduled and underway at the facility’s Wiston House estate in West Sussex.
The exclusion of Sudan’s official Transitional Sovereignty Council has drawn fierce condemnation from the Sudanese government. Amgad Fareid Eltayeb, a senior adviser to the council, slammed the UK’s decision as inconsistent with its public rhetoric around human rights and accountability in Sudan.
“We saw a lot of statements from the US and UK governments showing concern about what the RSF would do if they took el-Fasher. It’s the same rhetoric we still hear, the same talk… But while the British government is echoing concern about possible crimes committed by the RSF, a possible genocide committed by the RSF, they have invited RSF affiliates to England to discuss the future of Sudan,” Eltayeb told Middle East Eye.
“Anything that needs to be discreet is hiding something that makes it necessary for it to be discreet. The UAE’s support for the RSF has been documented even by their own parliament, and so we have very little confidence or trust in what the British government is trying to do discreetly,” he added.
Critics have also pointed to deep economic ties between the UK and UAE that may inform the UK’s approach to the Sudan conflict. Official trade data shows the UK has exported £422 million ($565 million) worth of arms to the UAE over the past three years, and independent open source investigations have already confirmed British-made military equipment originating from the UAE has been recovered from RSF fighters on Sudan battlefields.
For Eltayeb, this creates an unmistakable pattern of contradictory behavior: “We can see a pattern of complicity here. They issue statements of concern about the RSF possibly committing genocide, then invite their leadership to discuss the future of Sudan.”
A veteran British policy expert with decades of experience working on Sudanese peace negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid professional repercussions, called the exclusion of key Sudanese stakeholders from the conference “fairly outrageous.” The expert noted that many longstanding Sudanese peace advocates and experienced negotiators were not only uninvited but completely unaware the conference was being organized.
The controversial gathering comes just 48 hours after former Labour Party leader Ed Miliband was appointed as the UK’s new foreign secretary in Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s new cabinet. Notably, Miliband did not mention Sudan or its ongoing civil war in his opening public address after taking office, as the new UK government has prioritized other pressing foreign policy issues including the war in Ukraine, rising tensions with Iran, and the ongoing conflict in Gaza. Miliband’s brother, David Miliband, currently serves as CEO of the International Rescue Committee, a major humanitarian organization operating in Sudan.
Diplomatic sources, however, tell Middle East Eye that some Sudanese and international stakeholders hold tentative hope that Miliband will take a harder stance against the UAE’s role in fueling the Sudan conflict, which the UN has classified as the world’s worst current humanitarian crisis. More than a year into the war, official estimates place the death toll at hundreds of thousands, and over 14 million Sudanese have been displaced from their homes.