(United Nations) The UN envoy to Sudan, the German Volker Perthes, who has become the bête noire of the Sudanese army which demanded his dismissal, announced Wednesday that he had resigned, warning of the risk of ” civil war” in this country ravaged by armed conflict.
“I thank the Secretary-General (of the UN, Antonio Guterres) for this opportunity and for the trust he has placed in me, but I have asked him to relieve me of this function,” Mr. Perthes declared before the Security Council, without giving reasons for his departure.
Asked if he had accepted this resignation, Antonio Guterres replied to journalists: “Yes. He had good reasons to resign and I must respect his wishes and accept his resignation.”
Mr Perthes delivered a damning report to the Council, pitting the two sides in the conflict, the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), against each other.
“What started as a conflict between two military formations could turn into a full-blown civil war,” he said, stressing that “the fighting shows no signs of calming and neither side seems close.” of a decisive military victory.
At least 40 people were killed again on Wednesday in Nyala, capital of South Darfur, in army air raids, a medical source and witnesses told AFP.
Regrets from Washington
Mr. Perthes had been the UN envoy to Sudan for two and a half years and headed the UN mission, UNAMIT, created in June 2020 to support the democratic transition in Sudan after the fall, the previous year, by Omar al-Bashir.
General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane called for his dismissal last June, blaming him for the war which broke out in mid-April with the paramilitaries of General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo.
The Sudanese government had threatened to request the departure of the UN political mission in Sudan if Mr. Perthes remained in his post, and considered him persona non grata in Sudan.
The UN Security Council extended the UN political mission in Sudan by just six months in early June.
Speaking during the debate, the United States Ambassador, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said she “regretted” her departure and considered Sudan’s threats “unacceptable”.
“No country should be allowed to threaten the ability of this Council to pursue its peace and security responsibilities,” she said.
In his report, Mr. Perthes calls “to make the belligerents understand that they cannot act with impunity and that they will have to answer for the crimes committed.”
“There is little doubt about the responsibilities,” he added, denouncing “the indiscriminate aerial bombardments” carried out by the Sudanese army.
“Most of the sexual violence, looting and killings take place in areas controlled by the RSF,” he further noted, while “both sides arbitrarily arrest, detain and even torture civilians, and carry out executions extrajudicial activities have been reported.
According to figures he cited, some 5,000 people have been killed since the start of the conflict on April 15 and more than 12,000 injured, figures he said are well below reality.
Multiple international attempts to mediate the conflict have so far failed to establish a lasting truce.
The fighting, which has left nearly five million displaced and refugees, has worsened the humanitarian crisis in the country, one of the poorest in the world.