Rebel fighters in Sudan's civil war have landed on a lucrative way to funding their brutal campaign: looting the country's museums.
Historians and curators say the Rapid Support Forces that have been fighting government forces for the past three years are now targeting Sudan's rich cultural history and selling it to the highest bidder in the illicit international art market.
Across the country, their fighters have joined private looters in stripping museums of valuable artifacts chronicling the country's history from the Stone Age to the rise of Islam.
Sudan's National Corporation for Antiquities and Museums, or NCAM, estimates they have looted treasures worth $150 million since the conflict began.
United Nations investigators say the stolen pieces are then sold to art traders and the proceeds used to pay for the drones, armored vehicles and artillery shells the RSF is using in a war that has claimed the lives of more than 150,000 people and uprooted more than 14 million others.
