Sudan: military deadlocked, UN attempts mediation

Brick barricades erected by Sudanese anti-coup protesters block a lane on 60 Street in East Khartoum on October 31, 2021. AFP - -

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Sudanese hostile to General al-Burhan's coup are still determined to stand up to the army.

On Sunday October 31, the strike continued in Khartoum.

The toll of the repression of the day on Saturday grew heavier: a union of doctors, which had recorded at least three dead and a hundred injured, announced the death of two other demonstrators.

Aged 22 and 19, they were shot in the head.

On Sunday, Volker Perthes, secretary general of Minuats, the UN mission for the Sudanese transition, met the sacked Prime Minister and said he was conducting mediations to try to find a solution to the crisis.

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" Volker Perthes said Sunday, October 31, after an interview with the ousted Prime Minister in his home in Kafouri, still under high military protection.

Since the coup, the representative of the UN mission has met with

but also with Hemedti, the head of a powerful paramilitary militia who acts in the shadow of this coup. State and whose men were particularly violent in the repression of demonstrators.

Just met with @SudanPMHamdok at his residence where he remains well but under house arrest.

We discussed options for mediation and the way forward for Sudan.

I will continue these efforts with other Sudanese stakeholders.

- Volker Perthes (@volkerperthes) October 31, 2021

Saturday's mobilization

showed once again that the generals do not have the support of the Sudanese street.

For several days, al-Burhan has tried, in vain, to appoint a new prime minister.

So far, no candidate wants to endorse the wrath of the streets.

The army chief tries to convince Abdallah Hamdok to return to the head of a cabinet of technocrats.

But the latter refuses to do so for the moment.

If hundreds of thousands of Sudanese demanded his release on Saturday, they also sent a clear message: they no longer want the military in power.

However, the ongoing diplomatic discussions indicate that the foreign chancelleries are pushing for a return to the

that prevailed before the coup, that is to say a sharing of power between civilians and soldiers, as granted to the

.

But this attempt to offer the generals a way out will be very badly perceived by the population, warn several analysts, and would amount to tolerating this kind of coup.

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• Sudan

• Abdallah Hamdok

• Abdel Fattah al-Burhan

• UN