Shots rang out Sunday in Khartoum, on the sixth day of a ceasefire which expires Monday evening and was to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid, but which has never been respected by the army and the paramilitaries at war in Sudan.
In Darfur, a vast region in the west of the country, the governor called on civilians to arm themselves, raising the specter of civil war.
“We hear shooting in the south of the city,” residents of the Sudanese capital told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Sunday.
The United States and Saudi Arabia, which negotiated the ongoing week-long truce with General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane’s army and General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), called for its extension beyond its scheduled expiration Monday at 3:45 p.m. EST.
The two camps blame each other for having broken this truce, which was to allow the establishment of secure corridors to deliver humanitarian aid.
“Both sides told mediators to aim for de-escalation […] and yet they are positioning themselves for escalation,” the mediators said in a statement, arguing that humanitarians must “be given more time to carry out their vital work.”
Humanitarian organizations claim to have been able to deliver only very small quantities of food and medicine, while 25 of the 45 million Sudanese now need help to survive, according to the UN.
If no safe corridor is cleared, the NGO Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has warned that it could be forced to suspend its activities.
The war, which broke out on April 15, left more than 1,800 dead, according to the NGO ACLED, which specializes in collecting information in conflict zones, more than a million displaced people and more than 300,000 refugees in neighboring countries, according to the UN.
” Take up arms “
The FSR said they were “ready to negotiate the extension of the ceasefire”, subject to the respect by the army of the current truce. The army said it was “examining the possibility of accepting an extension”.
However, like the previous ones, this ceasefire did not lead to a cessation of fighting.
The situation is particularly critical in Darfur, the region, with Khartoum, the most affected by the fighting and already ravaged by a deadly war which had broken out in 2003.
Its governor, the former rebel leader Minni Minnawi, now close to the army, called on Sunday “young and old, women and men, to take up arms to defend their property”.
Already, according to the UN, armed civilians and tribal or rebel fighters have joined the clashes between soldiers and paramilitaries.
While, according to the Small Arms Survey (SAS) research project, 6.6% of Sudanese own a firearm, the army on Friday called on retired soldiers to take up arms. At the beginning of May, in the east of the country, hundreds of members of the Beja tribes demonstrated to demand arms from General Burhane.
“People who belonged to non-violent movements are now thinking of arming themselves to protect themselves,” said Sudanese pro-democracy activist Raga Makawi.
The Umma party, one of the main civil parties in the country, warned on Sunday “against calls to arm citizens under the pretext of protecting themselves”, seeing in them “attempts to drag the country into the civil war “.
African “roadmap”
On Saturday, General Burhane demanded the dismissal of the UN envoy to Sudan, Volker Perthes, making him bear the responsibility for the war.
The head of the army, de facto ruler of Sudan, accuses Mr. Perthes of having “concealed” the explosive situation in Khartoum. Without these “lies”, General “Daglo would not have launched his military operations”, he said.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he was “shocked”, expressing “his full confidence” in his envoy. Washington expressed its “resolute support” to him.
Along with the Americans and the Saudis, the African Union, which suspended Sudan in retaliation for the putsch of the two generals, now rivals, in 2021, is trying to organize discussions with IGADthe East African regional bloc of which the country is a part, under the aegis of the President of South Sudan, Salva Kiir.
On Sunday, the pan-African organization claimed to have “adopted a roadmap” providing for “the cessation of hostilities” and “the resumption of the transition to a democratic government led by civilians”.