Latent for weeks, the rivalry between the two generals behind the putsch in Sudan exploded Saturday, April 15, in Khartoum, which awoke to the sound of explosions and fighting.

During the October 2021 coup, army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhane and the paramilitary boss of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Mohamed Hamdane Daglo, known as "Hemedti", appeared together, forming a united front to oust civilians from power.

But over time, Hemedti has continued to denounce the coup, to side with civilians - therefore against the army in political negotiations - and it is now his dispute with General Burhane that prevents any solution to the crisis in Sudan.

On Saturday, the political standoff took to the streets: in several neighborhoods of Khartoum, almost uninterrupted shooting and explosions shook the inhabitants of the country, long torn by war and ostracized for many years.

RSF claims to have taken control of Khartoum airport

The RSF announced, late in the morning, to have taken "control" of the international airport of Khartoum, in the heart of the capital, calling on the inhabitants to "rally to them to protect the homeland and the gains of the revolution", the popular revolt that overthrew the dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

In Khartoum, where no one dares to circulate anymore, witnesses report a deployment of fighting near the residence of General Burhane, without any independent source being able to physically go there to testify.

Both parties, on the other hand, blame each other for starting the fire.

The RSF, which brings together former militiamen of the Darfur war, said they were "surprised in the morning by the arrival of a large contingent of the army that besieged their camp of Soba".

The army, they accused in a statement, "attacked them with all kinds of heavy and light weapons".

The army retorts that it was the RSF that started: "The army is doing its duty to protect the homeland," army spokesman General Nabil Abdallah told AFP.

According to him, the fighting in Khartoum actually broke out when the RSF attacked army bases "in Khartoum and elsewhere in Sudan".

Access to the presidential palace blocked

In response, the military deployed throughout the capital: their tanks blocked access to the presidential palace, bridges leading to the suburbs and the headquarters of the general staff.

On Thursday, the army already denounced a "dangerous" deployment of paramilitaries in Khartoum and other cities in Sudan "without the approval or any coordination with the command of the armed forces".

She then sounded "the alarm" in the face of "a dangerous and historic turning point".

For days, while civilians and the international community were forced to accept a new postponement of the signing of a political agreement supposed to break the deadlock - because of the differences between the two generals - videos did not cease to show from different neighborhoods, the arrival of many armored vehicles and men, especially in Khartoum.

The future of the paramilitaries is now the main issue in Sudan: any return to democratic transition is suspended until their integration into the regular troops.

If the army does not refuse it, it still wants to impose its conditions of admission and limit their incorporation in time. General Daglo, for his part, calls for broad inclusion and, above all, his place within the General Staff.

It is this dispute that is still blocking the return to the transition demanded by the international community to resume its aid to Sudan, one of the poorest countries in the world.

With AFP

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