Highlights: Fighting raged on Tuesday (June 27th) in Khartoum between paramilitaries threatening to take the city and the army. Since the beginning of the war on 15 April, the RSF has been present en masse in the residential areas where they had long established their bases. The army, for its part, tries to play its main asset: the air, which it controls alone, without its infantry managing to gain a foothold in the immense city crossed by two arms of the Nile.

Fighting raged on Tuesday (June 27th) in Khartoum between paramilitaries threatening to take the city and the army, which is now calling on all young people in Sudan to enlist in the armed forces,...

Sudan: heavy fighting in Khartoum, the two enemy generals speak out for Eid

Fighting raged on Tuesday (June 27th) in Khartoum between paramilitaries who threaten to take the city and the army, which is now calling on all young people in Sudan to enlist in the armed forces, on the eve of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.

A police patrol in front of Wad Madani market, June 24, 2023. (Illustrative image) AFP--

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In the capital, fighting between the army, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) of General Mohamed Hamdane Daglo, known as "Hemedti", is now concentrated around military bases. Since the beginning of the war on 15 April, the RSF has been present en masse in the residential areas where they had long established their bases. The army, for its part, tries to play its main asset: the air, which it controls alone, without its infantry managing to gain a foothold in the immense city crossed by two arms of the Nile.

For several days, the RSF has been trying to take the last army bases in the capital where millions of inhabitants are still hiding - nearly a million and a half have left, fleeing stray bullets and water and electricity cuts in exhausting heat. The RSF took over the police headquarters and its huge arsenal in southern Khartoum and harassed the army on bases in central, northern and southern Khartoum on Tuesday, residents told AFP. If they take the latter bases, they will have taken control of Khartoum, experts say.

The two generals address the nation

On the occasion of Eid al-Adha, the two warring generals split a message to the nation. General al-Burhan to call on state television "all the young people of the country and all those who can defend it not to hesitate to do so (...) or to join military units." And General Daglo to respond in a voice recording posted online to accusations of "crimes against humanity" of the UN and "ethnic" war in Darfur (west), where his former militiamen are accused of atrocities in the bloody war launched in 2003.

On Tuesday, again, the Troika for Sudan -- Norway, the United States and Britain -- denounced "human rights violations, sexual violence and ethnically motivated violence, attributed globally to the RSF and their allied militias." The head of the paramilitaries promised "swift and strict action" against his men who carried out such abuses, while the RSF claims to have begun to judge some members "undisciplined".

And as calls for civilians multiply to demonstrate massively against RSF abuses in Khartoum on Friday, June 30, Hemedti warned against the army's attempts to use civilians in war.

We have followed calls for demonstrations in areas of military operations launched by the army. We respect the right to peaceful protest, but these calls are a malicious plot that draws civilians into war. This ploy is designed to conceal the failure of the survivors of the old regime in their war against our valiant forces. They want to use unarmed civilians as fuel for this war. We call for not heeding these calls and avoiding demonstrations in areas of military operations in order to ensure the safety of our innocent citizens. Their attempt to solicit the help of citizens is ridiculous. Whoever cares about civilians does not bomb them with aircraft and artillery. This is happening now, as it has happened in the past in many parts of Sudan. The national problem we face in these delicate circumstances requires the unity and solidarity of all to eliminate those corrupt people who destroyed the Sudan and who are still seeking to restore their rule.

General Hemedti accuses the army of wanting to involve civilians in the war

Houda Ibrahim

General Daglo, himself from an Arab tribe in Darfur, called for "avoiding plunging into civil war" this gold-rich region where more than a quarter of Sudanese live. General al-Burhan denounced, like many inhabitants of non-Arab ethnic groups, a "genocide" of the RSF.

Sudan: heavy fighting in Khartoum, the two enemy generals speak out for Eid

Sudan: heavy fighting in Khartoum, the two enemy generals speak out for Eid

The two generals address the nation

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