The head of American diplomacy Antony Blink announced on Monday April 24 that the army and paramilitaries in conflict in Sudan agreed to a three-day ceasefire after ten days of deadly fighting.
“After intense negotiations over the past 48 hours, the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have agreed to implement a nationwide ceasefire effective midnight April 24 (Monday 22 h GMT), which should last 72 hours,” Antony Blinken said in a statement.
The FSR confirm and announce in a press release a “truce dedicated to the opening of humanitarian corridors and the facilitation of the movement of civilians”.
Khaled Omar Youssef, spokesperson for the Forces of Freedom and Change (FLC, Sudan’s historic civil bloc) told AFP that he welcomed “American mediation, for the establishment of this humanitarian truce. “It will give rise to a dialogue on the modalities of a definitive ceasefire”, he specifies, while the American Secretary of State also indicates that working with the allies and partners of the United States in for the establishment of a “commission” to negotiate a permanent cessation of hostilities in Sudan.
L’HIM earlier on Monday called for an end to the fighting to “steer Sudan away from the precipice”. And if for several days, the two belligerents had already announced that they would accept breaks in the fighting, each time they accused each other of having broken the truce.
This time, “during this period, the United States expects the army and the FSR to fully and immediately respect this ceasefire”, warned the American Secretary of State.
Exodus
Explosions, air raids and shootings have not stopped since April 15 in Khartoum, pushing thousands of inhabitants from the capital plunged into chaos to exodus. Those who cannot flee try to survive, deprived of water and electricity, subject to food shortages and internet and telephone cuts.
On Monday, the doctors’ union launched an urgent appeal: “Several districts of Khartoum are bombarded, there are civilian deaths and around fifty seriously injured, all nearby doctors must go there as soon as possible”.
The fighting has already left more than 420 dead and 3,700 injured, according to the World Health Organization (OMS).
The violence in this eastern countryAfricaone of the poorest in the world, risk “invading the whole region and beyond”, warned the UN Secretary General, Anthony Guterres. Despite the departure of many diplomats and foreign citizens, Volker Perthes, the head of the UN mission which has been trying for four years to obtain from the military in power a transition to democracy, announced that he would remain in Sudan.
The foreign capitals managed to negotiate passages with the two belligerents: the army of General Abdel Fattah al-Burhanede facto ruler of Sudan, and his deputy who became his rival, General Mohamed Hamdane Daglowhich commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (FSR).
More than 1,000 EU nationals were evacuated. “A first group” of Chinese, several dozen South Africans and hundreds of nationals of Arab countries also left, by road, sea or air. Japan has evacuated 45 nationals and their spouses from Sudan and temporarily closed its embassy there, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and officials said on Tuesday.
Around 700 international staff from the UN, NGOs and embassies “have been evacuated to Port Sudan”, the UN said. Dozens of other aid workers were evacuated to the Chad since Darfurin the West, the region most affected by the fighting with Khartoum.
Most of the foreigners evacuated are diplomatic personnel, such as those from the United States and the United Kingdom. Many nationals are still waiting for a place in the long convoys of white cars or buses that leave continuously from Khartoum.
“Fear for the Future”
Experts and humanitarians are now worried about the fate of the Sudanese. “I fear for their future,” admitted Norwegian Ambassador Endre Stiansen.
Both sides accuse each other of attacking prisons to get hundreds of detainees out and of looting homes and factories. Clashes erupted near several banks.
In a country where inflation is already in three digits in normal times, the kilo of rice or the liter of gasoline are now traded at gold prices. But fuel is the key to escape to Egypt, 1,000 kilometers to the north, or to reach Port-Sudan and hope to board a boat.
“As foreigners who can flee, the impact of the violence on an already critical humanitarian situation is worsening,” warns the UN, whose agencies, like many humanitarian organizations, have suspended their activities.
Five aid workers have been killed and, according to the doctors’ union, nearly three-quarters of hospitals are out of service.
Sudanese have already fled to Egypt and South Sudan, which has 800,000 refugees in Sudan. Among them, women and children are now crossing in the other direction, according to the UN. At least 20,000 Sudanese have taken refuge in Chad, bordering Darfur.
Again on Monday, witnesses told AFP that thousands of people had taken the direction of the Chadian border, fleeing “fighting” in el-Geneina, in Darfur.
This region, the poorest in the country, was ravaged in the 2000s by a war ordered by the dictator Omar al-Bashirdeposed in 2019, and led in particular by the Janjawid militiamen, from which the FSR originated.
The war had been simmering for weeks between the two rival generals, who had joined forces to oust civilians from power during the 2021 putsch, then ending the democratic transition, but who failed to agree on the integration of FSR into regular troops.
Earlier Monday Washington expressed “very serious concerns” over the presence in Sudan of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, which it said is bringing “where it is present its share of additional death and destruction”. News reports citing officials reported weapons supplied by Wagner to the FSR.
With AFP
2023-04-24 21:21:02
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