The United Nations said on Wednesday more than half Sudan’s population now needed aid and protection, as civilians sought shelter from air strikes and sporadic clashes between rival military factions in the Khartoum area.

Residents said power had been cut, food was in short supply, and drinking water scarce due to the violent power struggle, now in its second month despite international mediation efforts.

Launching an appeal for some $3 billion in aid, the United Nations said 25 million people needed help – the highest number ever recorded in Sudan, where around 15 million needed aid before the conflict.

Signalling no let-up in the conflict between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), anti-aircraft guns and drones could be heard on Wednesday in the capital, residents reported.

“We have been moving from one place to the other in past days,” said 27-year-old Abbas al-Sayyed, speaking to Reuters by phone from Bahri, a city adjoining the capital Khartoum, epicentre of a conflict that has killed hundreds of people.

“There is no electricity, no water at all, and even the bread we used to get in the first days of the war, we can’t get now. We can’t move out,” he said.

Clashes continued around Al-Jaili in Bahri, home to the country’s largest oil refinery, residents said, and more violence was reported in El-Obeid in North Kordofan State, southwest of Khartoum.

The army led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan has been using air strikes and shelling in a bid to root out RSF fighters under the command of General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, who are entrenched in residential areas of Khartoum.

On Tuesday the army released a video showing Burhan dressed in army fatigues with a rifle slung over his back, greeting troops at what appeared to be the army headquarters in Khartoum. Reuters could not immediately verify the video.

Across Sudan, the fighting has uprooted around 1 million people, 220,000 of whom have fled into neighbouring states.

Talks mediated by the United States and Saudi Arabia in Jeddah have so far failed to secure a ceasefire.