The violence started because of a disagreement over an internationally supported plan.
Khartoum:
Sudan’s army said on Saturday it had agreed to help evacuate foreign nationals as sporadic shelling and airstrikes hit Khartoum despite a promise made by the warring sides for three days after a week of clashes. in which hundreds of people were killed.
The statement, citing army chief Abdel Fatteh al-Burhan, came after promises by rival Rapid Support Force (RSF) leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti, to open airports for evacuations.
A Reuters reporter in Khartoum said the sounds of fighting continued overnight but appeared less intense on Saturday morning than the previous day. Live broadcasts by regional news channels showed rising smoke and rumblings of explosions.
Both the army and the paramilitary RSF, which has been waging a deadly power struggle across the country, issued statements saying they would maintain a three-day ceasefire starting Friday for Islam’s Eid al-Fitr holiday.
Sudan’s sudden collapse into war has dashed plans to restore civilian rule, pushing the already impoverished country to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe and threatening a wider conflict that could draw in outside powers .
So far there is no sign that either side can score a quick victory or is ready to back down and talk. The army has air power but the RSF is widely entrenched in urban areas, including key facilities in central Khartoum.
Burhan and Hemedti held the top two positions in the ruling council overseeing a political transition following the 2021 coup, which was intended to include civilian rule and the merger of the RSF with the military.
The World Health Organization said on Friday that 413 people have been killed and 3,551 injured since the fighting began. The death toll includes at least five aid workers in a country dependent on food aid.
International efforts to quell the violence have focused on the ceasefire, with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken calling for the ceasefire to be respected.
The US and some other countries have prepared efforts to evacuate their citizens. The military said the United States, Britain, France and China would evacuate diplomats and other civilians from Khartoum “in the coming hours”.
The army said that Saudi Arabia’s embassy had already been evacuated by land to Port Sudan and blown up there and that Jordan would follow suit.
RSF chief Hemedti said on Facebook early Saturday that he received a phone call from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in which he “stressed the need to observe a complete ceasefire and provide protection to humanitarian and medical workers”.
RSF said it was prepared to partially open all airports to allow evacuations. However, Khartoum’s international airport has been caught in the fighting and the status of other airports or the RSF’s control over them is unclear.
hit the hospital
In Omdurman, one of Khartoum’s nearby sister cities, there were fears over the fate of detainees at Al-Huda prison, the largest in Sudan.
The army on Friday accused the RSF of raiding the prison, which the paramilitary force denied. Lawyers for a prisoner there said in a statement that an armed group had forcibly vacated the prison, adding that the whereabouts of the detainees were not known.
The Sudanese doctors’ union said early Saturday that more than two-thirds of hospitals in conflict zones were out of service, with 32 forced out by troops or caught in the crossfire.
The few remaining hospitals, which lacked adequate water, staff and electricity, were providing only first aid. People posted urgent requests on social media for medical help, transport to hospital and prescriptions.
Any lull in fighting on Saturday could intensify a desperate rush to escape the fighting after many Khartoum residents were trapped in their homes or local districts under bombardment and spent days with fighters roaming the streets.
Sudan borders seven countries and lies between Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia, and Africa’s volatile Sahel region. Hostilities run the risk of escalating regional tensions.
The violence was triggered by disagreements over an internationally supported plan to form a new civilian government four years after the fall of autocrat Omar al-Bashir and two years after a military coup.
Both sides accuse each other of containing the infection.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)