No respite in Sudan. Fighting raged on Saturday (May 6th) in Khartoum as the army and paramilitaries fighting for power are due to discuss a new truce in Saudi Arabia.

As every day since 15 April, the inhabitants of the capital live to the rhythm of the bombings, without water or electricity and with very few reserves of food and money.

While the Americans and Saudis assure that the military and paramilitaries intend to discuss a truce, the two sides accused each other Saturday of attacking the convoy of the Turkish ambassador in Khartoum without specifying whether the attack had caused casualties.

Witnesses told AFP that General Abdel Fattah al-Burhane's army carried out air raids in various parts of Khartoum, including Riyadh – which takes its name from the Saudi capital – hours before negotiations between its representatives and those of rival General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo's Rapid Support Forces (RSF) began in Jeddah, another Saudi city.

"Pre-negotiation discussions"

"The army delegation will only talk about the truce and how to properly implement it to facilitate humanitarian access for people," army spokesman General Nabil Abdallah told AFP. For days, officially, a truce has been extended and violated within minutes of its entry into force.

The United States and Saudi Arabia, which now appear to be maneuvering diplomatically, spoke of "pre-negotiation talks," urging the warring parties to "actively engage" in a ceasefire. But the two countries have yet to announce whether those talks have begun.

Before waging this merciless war, Generals Burhane and Daglo had led together in 2021 a putsch that ousted civilians from power and put an end to the democratic transition, begun after the fall of dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019.

Former civilian minister Khaled Omar Youssef, who was sacked during the coup, said he hoped for a "comprehensive political solution" but both sides have been repeating for days that no political component is planned immediately.

The two generals have, from the beginning of the war, violently invectivated each other through the media and both assure that they no longer want to speak to each other directly.

According to Sudanese officials, the RSF will be represented by relatives of General Daglo and his powerful brother Abderrahim, who is considered the financier of the RSF with his gold mines.

See also Who are the RSF, these paramilitaries opposed to the army in Sudan?

On the army side, will be present senior officers known for their hostility to the RSF, according to these same sources.

The Saudis are great allies and backers of both sides in Sudan. And the United States allowed Sudan to return to the community of nations by lifting two decades of sanctions in 2020.

Both countries seem to want to take precedence over regional initiatives. The East African bloc IGAD is also trying to bring the generals back to the negotiating table through South Sudan, Sudan's historic mediator.

The African Union lost its leverage when it suspended Sudan after the 2021 coup, experts say.

As for the Arab League, it is due to meet on Sunday the foreign ministers of its member countries, deeply divided over Sudan.

Sudanese without telephones

On the ground, the fighting, which is entering its fourth week, has left some 700 dead, according to the NGO Acled which lists victims of conflict. They also left 5,000 wounded, 335,000 displaced and 115,000 refugees, according to the UN.

On Friday, they also killed 12 civilians in El-Obeid, 300 km south of the capital, according to the doctors' union.

Beyond the direct victims, this conflict is increasing hunger, a scourge that already affected a third of Sudan's 45 million people. According to the UN, between 2 and 2.5 million more people could be acutely malnourished within six months if fighting continues.

For experts, the war will be long as the two belligerents seem to have the same combat capabilities and are reluctant to engage in political negotiations before winning on the ground.

The Sudanese, for their part, still live barricaded for fear of stray bullets, in scorching heat and now largely without telephone: the operator MTN has announced the cessation of its services because it can no longer supply its generators with fuel.

In Darfur, on the western border of Chad, civilians have been armed to participate in clashes between military, paramilitary and tribal or rebel fighters, according to the UN.

Nearly 200 people were killed there, according to the NGO Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).

In Port Sudan, on the coast spared by the violence, the UN and more and more NGOs are trying to negotiate the delivery of aid shipments to Khartoum and Darfur, where hospitals and humanitarian stocks have been looted and bombed.

With AFP

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