(Khartoum) Violent clashes between the Sudanese army and paramilitaries resumed Sunday in Khartoum, as a fragile three-day truce, which has never really been respected on the ground, is about to expire.
Millions of Sudanese have been trapped in shelling and gunfire since the April 15 outbreak of a ruthless power struggle between General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane’s army and his number two, General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo, who commands the Rapid Support Forces (FSR), particularly feared paramilitaries.
Like the first, this truce, which expires Sunday at midnight (6 p.m. Eastern time), did not silence the guns, especially in Darfur.
On Sunday, a first plane loaded with eight tonnes of aid and which should be able to treat 1,500 people landed in Port-Sudan, a coastal town 850 km east of Khartoum, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). ).
PHOTO PROVIDED BY THE INTERNATIONAL COMMITTEE OF THE RED CROSS VIA REUTERS
According to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the cargo delivered to Port Sudan contains “anesthetic products, dressings, suture materials and other surgical items”.
The war has left 528 dead and 4,599 injured, according to widely underestimated official figures, and both sides accuse each other of violating the truce.
On Sunday, witnesses reported fighting near the army headquarters in Khartoum, airstrikes in Omdurman, a northern suburb of the capital overflown by fighter jets.
“There is very heavy fighting, gunshots ring out in my street […] since dawn,” a witness told AFP.
“Intensify efforts”
As the fighting has raged for more than two weeks, residents of the capital, when not fleeing, remain barricaded, trying to survive shortages of food, water and electricity.
Khartoum state authorities have announced that they are granting “leave until further notice” to civil servants in the capital, while the police have confirmed their deployment in the city to prevent looting, as announced by the army.
Most of the country’s hospitals are out of service because of the fighting and, for those that are still functioning, “the situation is untenable” because there is a lack of basic supplies, Majzoub Saad Ibrahim, a doctor in Ad-Damir, told AFPTV. , capital of the Nile State, north of Khartoum.
According to the UN, 75,000 people are internally displaced and at least 20,000 have fled to Chad, 4,000 to South Sudan, 3,500 to Ethiopia and 3,000 to the Central African Republic. In total, up to 270,000 people could flee the fighting which affects 12 of the 18 states of this country of 45 million inhabitants, one of the poorest in the world.
PHOTO FAYEZ NURELDINE, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Evacuees stand on a ferry carrying some 1,900 people across the Red Sea from Port Sudan to Saudi Arabia’s King Faisal naval base in Jeddah on April 29, 2023.
Foreign governments have evacuated their nationals and citizens of other nationalities, especially from Port Sudan to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on the other side of the Red Sea.
The head of Saudi diplomacy, Faisal ben Farhane, received an emissary from General Burhane on Sunday but despite calls from the international community, no diplomatic solution is in sight between the two rivals in fatigues.
“The UN is stepping up its efforts to help people seeking safety in neighboring countries”, assures its Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Twitter, who says he supports any African mediation.
“Armed Tribes”
According to the UN, around 100 people have been killed since Monday in El-Geneina, where, according to the Ministry of Health, “armed violence between tribes” caused the destruction of the main hospital in the city, chief- place of West Darfur, a region still marked by the bloody civil war of the 2000s.
The UN chief warned of a “terrible” situation in Darfur with “tribes now trying to arm themselves”.
As the humanitarian drama worsens, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) announced the cessation of “virtually all [ses] activities” because of the violence.
At the head of the Janjawid militiamen, General Daglo, known as “Hemedti”, had carried out the scorched earth policy in Darfur, on the orders of Omar el-Bashir, the former dictator overthrown in 2019 by the street.
The war that started in 2003 left about 300,000 dead and nearly 2.5 million displaced, according to the UN. Since then, the Janjawid have evolved and officially gave birth in 2013 to the FSR, a paramilitary auxiliary to the army.
Today rivals, Generals Burhane and Daglo had nevertheless joined forces during the 2021 putsch to oust the civilians with whom they had shared power since the fall of Bashir.
But differences then appeared and, for lack of agreement on the integration of the FSR into the army, degenerated into open war.
Experts from the Carnegie Middle East Center have warned that Hemedti could “mobilize Arab tribes in Darfur and other regions”. “The longer he can hold his positions in Khartoum, the greater his weight will be at the negotiating table,” they added.