Fighting is raging in Sudan for a third day Monday after battles between the Sudanese army and the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), led by rival generals who have controlled the country since their 2021 coup, killed dozens of civilians and wounded hundreds more people, amid international calls for a cease-fire.
The intense gunfire rocked the capital Khartoum’s northern and southern suburbs, sendingplumes of smoke into the sky.
The UN secretary-general's special representative for Sudan, Volker Perthes, addressed the press on Monday afternoon via video call from Khartoum, revealing that the recent violence in Sudan had resulted in the deaths of over 180 people and left around 1,800 injured. Additionally, certain UN facilities had been destroyed and looted, leading to the evacuation of some nonessential staff members.
Earlier, the Central Committee of Sudan Doctors, an independent pro-democracy group of medics, reported 97 civilians killed—among them, three employees of the UN World Food Program—and dozens among security forces dead, as well as 942 people injured.
Violence reaches peak
Violence between the Sudanese Armed Forces and a government paramilitary force, the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), reached its peak on Saturday. Sudan has struggled to transition to civilian rule after the overthrow of dictator Omar Bashir in 2019; the current clashes are a further barrier on the road to democracy.
Tensions have been deepening for weeks between Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who is the head of the armed forces and the country’s de facto president, and his deputy and leader of the RSF, Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti, who has also been deputy leader of Sudan’s ruling council since 2019.
Fighting has also erupted outside Khartoum, including in the troubled West Darfur region. Both sides claim they control key sites.
The RSF is an officially recognized independent security force comprising about 100,000 troops, who are predominantly Arab. Bashir unleashed the force in 2013 against non-Arab ethnic minorities in West Darfur, drawing accusations of war crimes.
Since then, Gen. Dagalo has built a powerful force that has intervened in conflicts in Yemen and Libya and controls some of Sudan’s gold mines.
The RSF’s proposed integration into the regular army was a critical element in the talks to finalize an agreement that would return the country to civilian rule and end the political- economic crisis. The integration process was abruptly halted by a coup in October 2021 that triggered new mass pro-democracy rallies across Sudan.
Burhan, a career soldier from northern Sudan who rose the ranks under the three-decade ruleof now-jailed Islamist general Bashir, has said the coup was “necessary” to include more actions into politics.Tension has been brewing between the two since then. A central cause of tension since the uprising is a civilian demand to oversee the military and the integration of the powerful RSF into the regular army, to which both have staunchly objected. Abdalla Hamdok, Sudan’s civilian former prime minister, released a video statement onSaturday calling for an immediate cease to the hostilities. “I demand al-Burhan, the army commanders, and the RSF leaders to stop the bullets immediately and for the voice of reason to rule,” he said in the address. “There is no victor over the corpses of its people.” UN chief António Guterres called for “an immediate cessation of hostilities” and spoke to both Burhan and Dagalo, while US Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned the fighting, saying that it “threatens the security and safety of Sudanese civilians.”
“There is no victor over the corpses of its people.”
Abdalla Hamdok
Guterres announced on Twitter that he would engage with the African Union and other regional leadership to help put a democratic transition back on track. The Arab League, following a request by Egypt, which has deep historical ties with Sudan and a close relationship with its military, and Saudi Arabia, held an urgent meeting on Sunday todiscuss the situation. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States form the“Quad,” which has sponsored mediation in Sudan along with the African Union and the United Nations. Western powers fear the potential for a Russian base on the Red Sea, which Sudanese military leaders have expressed openness to. Similar appeals came from the African Union, the European Union, Russia, and Iran.
Sudan is in a volatile region, bordering the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa. Its strategic location and agricultural wealth have attracted regional and international meddling, complicating the chances of a successful transition.
Several of Sudan’s neighbors, including Ethiopia, Chad, and South Sudan, have been affected by political upheavals and conflict. The military has been a dominant force in Sudan since its independence in 1956. During the 2019-2021 power-sharing arrangement, distrust between it and the civilian parties ran deep.