Sudanese refugees fleeing their country's devastating civil war are arriving in Morocco in growing numbers, only to find themselves trapped in a legal and administrative void that leaves them vulnerable despite reaching what they hoped would be safety.
Amir Ali, a 17-year-old from Sudan's Darfur region, spent two days hiding in the hills between Algeria and Morocco, watching border patrols with flashlights and dogs. When Moroccan guards finally caught him, his untreated heart condition caused him to collapse from the stress. After being beaten and detained by Algerian forces, he was bused back toward the Sahara — but he would attempt the crossing again.
"I had nowhere else to go," Ali said.
His journey exemplifies a new phase in Sudan's humanitarian crisis: displacement that now extends far beyond the conflict's immediate neighbors like Chad and South Sudan, reaching North African countries as refugees seek alternative routes to safety.
Sudan's civil war, which erupted in April 2023 between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, has created one of the world's largest displacement crises. The conflict has now pushed refugees across multiple regions, with many taking increasingly dangerous routes through Libya and Algeria to reach Morocco — often believing it will be the first place where they can formally claim refugee status.
By the end of 2025, the UN refugee agency UNHCR had registered 22,370 refugees and asylum seekers in Morocco from 67 countries, up from about 18,900 the previous year. Sudanese nationals accounted for the largest share of new arrivals, with 5,290 registered as of December 2025.
For many Sudanese, Morocco appears safer than attempting Mediterranean crossings to Europe. The country is widely regarded by analysts as one of the safer destinations in the region for refugees and is a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention. However, a long-promised asylum law has yet to be implemented, leaving much of the refugee protection process to be carried out by UNHCR itself.
"This is the most hurt community we have ever seen," said Yasmina Filali, president and founder of Fondation Orient-Occident, a Rabat-based organization supporting refugees. "It's painful and tragic ... this community is really, really in a bad shape."
The absence of comprehensive national asylum legislation creates what aid organizations describe as an improvised protection system. While Moroccan authorities can issue national refugee cards and residence permits through the Ministry of Interior, state support remains severely limited. Refugees receive no accommodation or access to secondary healthcare, and fewer than 0.5 percent of registered refugees and asylum seekers have accessed formal employment.
Ali's story illustrates the treacherous journey many Sudanese take to reach Morocco. After RSF fighters killed his entire family — parents, six brothers, and his sister — in el-Fasher, he was detained, beaten, and forced to pay for his release. His subsequent journey took him through South Sudan, Uganda, and into Libya, where he was kidnapped by traffickers who tortured those unable to pay ransoms.
"They hit you with anything they have," Ali recalled. With no surviving family to call for ransom money, he was eventually released when his captors realized they couldn't profit from him.
