Sudan: fighting intensified on Sunday between the regular army and the RSF

Khartoum, Sudan, April 15, 2023, near the Halfaya bridge over the Nile that separates Khartoum from Omdurman: smoke in the sky testifies to the fighting between the RSF militia and the regular army. REUTERS - MOHAMED NURELDIN ABDALLAH

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After months of tension, fighting broke out Saturday morning between soldiers of the regular army and the RSF, the militia of the number 2 of the Transition General Hemedti. The provisional toll, announced this Sunday morning by the doctors' union, is 56 dead among civilians, dozens of others among the belligerents and several hundred wounded.

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The sun dawned in Khartoum to the sound of Dushka machine guns and artillery fire. Throughout the night, the explosions continued, like a thunderstorm in the background, shaking the windows, reports our correspondent in Khartoum, Eliott Brachet. The inhabitants of the capital did not close their eyes, caulked at home. Only soldiers fight in the streets.

This Sunday morning, the clashes seem to have intensified, mainly located on the military bases that surround Khartoum to the south, north and west. But also in the heart of the capital, around the headquarters of the army from where plumes of smoke escape.

► READ ALSO: Confused situation in Sudan after a day of clashes between army and paramilitaries RSF

Reinforcements for the RSF this Sunday morning

The conflict has spread to many cities, Port Sudan and Kassala in eastern Sudan, El-Obeid in the centre, and Darfur in major cities. General Hemedti said yesterday that his paramilitary troops will not stop until they have control of all the military bases in the country. Several reports indicate that the RSF received reinforcements this morning in Khartoum. An army fighter jet carried out strikes this morning.

The RSF was created in Darfur in 2013 by former President Omar al-Bashir. It is then a question of using Janjaweed militias against rebel groups. But these paramilitaries have grown, as Roland Marchal, a researcher on Sudan at Sciences Po Paris, explains at the microphone of Gaëlle Laleix, of the Africa editorial team.

« 

The military created the RSF [Rapid Support Forces, editor's note], and in the rest of the decade of the 2010s - thanks in particular to the United Arab Emirates and the war in Yemen - it was a much greater empowerment of these paramilitary forces that were used in different conflicts, with the agreement of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. especially in Yemen and then even in Libya in their support for General Haftar. This economic empowerment has made this strength... has grown. Today, it is estimated at more than 110,000 men. It is really a second army, and obviously, its leader, acquiring both a much larger military profile and a much larger economic surface, decided that perhaps politics should be done. It is not so much that we are dealing with a great sincere democrat, it is above all someone who sees his political space increasingly restricted and who knows that his political and economic survival will be much more linked to a transition to civilian power, than to the maintenance of a junta that is dysfunctional and that does not allow anything at all. »

The command of the regular forces continues to communicate saying that victory is near, General al-Burhan appeared Saturday night greeting his troops in the streets. But a propaganda war is being launched. Everything can change very quickly. In view of their antagonistic statements, the two generals – Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Hemedti, formerallies in the 2021 coup – seem to have embarked on a fight to the death. In particular, the two disagree on how to integrate the RSF into the army. Provision provided for in the future political agreement supposed to eventually return power to civilians. Agreement whose signature has been postponed indefinitely

International concern, Arab League meeting

On Saturday, calls for a cessation of hostilities multiplied from the United Nations, the United States, Russia, the European Union and neighboring countries. Chad closed its border with Sudan on Saturday night.

The Arab League announced an emergency meeting in Cairo on Sunday at the request of Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Cairo expressed its deep concern. Egyptian soldiers have been taken prisoner by the Sudanese Rapid Support Forces while participating in air maneuvers with the Sudanese air force, reports our correspondent in Cairo, Alexandre Buccianti. "The Egyptian military are invaders" and therefore prisoners of war: this is what officers of the Rapid Support Force (RSF) said in a video showing Egyptian soldiers being manhandled at the Sudanese airport of Meroe.

Egyptian Mig 29s participating in the aerial maneuvers were sabotaged on the airport runway. The Egyptian military spokesman said that the Armed Forces were following the worrying developments in Sudan very closely. A few hours later, the head of the Rapid Support Force, General Hemedti said that the Egyptian military was not detained and regretted the publication of the video of their arrest. A statement aimed at preventing Egypt from becoming a party to the conflict between the Rapid Support Force and the Sudanese army. Many voices, especially on Egyptian social media, are calling for "revenge" through a military operation.

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