New investigations by The New York Times and The Washington Post present evidence that elements of Sudan's military developed and used improvised chlorine weapons, with a suspected attack reportedly occurring near the Al Jaili refinery north of Khartoum. Oilprice.com contributor Cyril Widdershoven says the allegations raise the stakes for Port Sudan's fuel and crude export infrastructure, already strained by disruption spilling over from the Hormuz standoff.
Dossier ties chemical weapons to an oil facility
Investigations published by The New York Times and The Washington Post present the most substantial publicly available evidence yet that elements of the Sudanese Armed Forces developed, stockpiled and apparently used improvised chlorine weapons. The dossier includes bomb designs, test videos, photographs and intercepted communications, and intelligence officials, former weapons inspectors and human-rights experts assessed it as credible. Sudan's military denies developing or using chemical weapons, while Khartoum maintains that American sanctions are politically motivated.
For energy markets, the key detail is that a suspected attack reportedly occurred near the Al Jaili refinery, north of Khartoum. Refineries, fuel depots, pipelines and port facilities have become direct targets in Sudan's civil war rather than incidental terrain.
Port Sudan is the pressure point
Port Sudan is Sudan's principal commercial harbor, the entry point for imported fuel and humanitarian supplies, and the outlet for Sudanese and South Sudanese crude oil. Long-range drone attacks in May 2025 already struck fuel depots, the Southern Port terminal, electricity infrastructure, the airport and the Flamingo naval base. South Sudan, a landlocked producer, depends on pipelines that cross Sudan and on export infrastructure at Port Sudan, so a prolonged shutdown could threaten more than the loss of several hundred thousand barrels per day that finance most of the South Sudanese state.
Sudan's own fuel supply is exposed too. Refining capacity cannot meet domestic demand, and parallel-market gasoline prices around Khartoum reportedly rose almost 67% in one week during April 2026 as external disruption fed through to the local economy.
Correlation with Hormuz and Yanbu is the real risk
Bab el-Mandeb traffic remains depressed, and threats have already disrupted Saudi oil movements from Yanbu, pushing tankers carrying Saudi crude to change course rather than sail through Bab el-Mandeb. Sudan's own crude volumes are too small to move global prices on their own. But if disruption at Port Sudan coincides with restricted Hormuz flows or damage to Yanbu, the market would treat the alternative routes built to compensate for Hormuz as unreliable too.
The most likely three-month path is more diplomatic pressure, additional sanctions and renewed calls for OPCW access, without direct foreign military intervention, keeping the immediate hit to oil prices modest. The tail risk is simultaneous escalation across Port Sudan, Yanbu, Bab el-Mandeb and Hormuz, at which point markets would be pricing the militarization of the entire corridor connecting the Gulf, the Red Sea and the Suez Canal.
Source: Oilprice.com
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