Sudan’s army recaptured a key town in Sudan’s grain-rich region on Saturday, driving out a paramilitary group that the United States accused of genocide last week.

Sudan’s information minister said the army had “liberated” the town, Wad Madani, while the army said its troops were working to “clear the remnants of the rebels” from the area.

If the army manages to hold the city, it would be its most significant victory since the start of the war almost two years ago. Experts said this would most likely shift the center of gravity of the war north to Khartoum, the capital.

Videos circulating online show the army entering Wad Madani, located about 100 miles south of the capital. Local media reported that fighters with the paramilitary group, known as the Rapid Support Force, or RSF, were fleeing the city.

The group’s leader, General Mohamed Hamdan, admitted defeat but promised to retake the city soon. “We lost the round today; we have not lost the battle,” he said in an audio address to his fighters and the Sudanese people.

The victory brought jubilant scenes in army-held parts of the country among Sudanese who hoped it could mark a turning point in a devastating civil war that has led to massacres, ethnic cleansing and widespread famine in one of Africa’s largest countries.

People gathered in the battle-torn streets of Khartoum as church bells rang in Port Sudan, the war’s de facto capital where many Sudanese have fled the fighting. Celebrations also broke out among exiled Sudanese in Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

The RSF’s defeat came just over a year after the group captured Wad Madani in a victory that sent tens of thousands of people fleeing and sent shock waves across Sudan. The group’s fighters continued to conquer parts of the country, far from their stronghold in Darfur in western Sudan.

But most of the most brutal fighting has been in Darfur, where RSF fighters have massacred members of rival ethnic groups, according to rights groups and the United Nations. Last week the United States formally determined that these murders constitute genocideand imposed sanctions on the leader of the RSF, General Hamdan, who is widely known as Hemeti.

The United States also imposed sanctions on seven companies in the United Arab Emirates that it accused of trading gold and buying weapons on behalf of the RSF

In recent months, the tide of fighting appeared to have changed as the RSF ceded territory in Khartoum and parts of the eastern country. The army launched a counter-offensive in the area around Wad Madani, culminating in the recapture of the town on Saturday.

However, it was too early to say whether the victory would fundamentally change the course of the conflict. Since the first shots were fired in April 2023, the momentum of the fighting has shifted back and forth, sometimes wildly.

The army and the RSF were once allies, and their leaders joined forces to launch a military coup in 2021. But in their war with each other, they enjoyed the support of various foreign powers.

The RSF is backed by the United Arab Emirates, a wealthy Gulf sponsor that supplies them with weapons and powerful drones, mostly smuggled into Sudan from neighboring countries.

The Sudanese military has acquired or bought weapons from Iran, Russia and Turkey. Both sides are mining the country’s vast gold reserves to fund the fight.

For ordinary Sudanese, the war has brought nothing but misery, death and destruction, killing tens of thousands of people, driving 11 million from their homes and causing one of the world’s worst famines in decades.

The Global Hunger Authority, known as the IPC, reported last month that famine had spread to five areas in Sudan and was expected to reach five more in the coming months. A total of 25 million Sudanese suffer from acute or chronic hunger.

Both sides have committed atrocities and war crimes, according to the United Nations and US officials, although only the RSF has been accused of ethnic cleansing.