Coup d’état in Sudan: the truce is a failure and the country enters the fifth day of fighting

Despite the 24-hour truce decreed on Tuesday, clashes between the Sudanese Army and the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (FAR) continued this Wednesday for the fifth consecutive day amidst cross accusations about who was responsible for violating the armistice.

According to the World Health Organization, there are already at least 270 dead and more than 2,000 injured as a result of the conflict that began last Saturday.

According to media reports and witness statements to EFE, the clashes and shootings took place this Wednesday morning, mainly near the General Command of the Armed Forces and the Presidential Palace, in Khartoum, the capital, where heavy fighting has taken place since the start of the fighting.

Columns of thick smoke were seen rising from the early hours of the day also in the area of ​​Khartoum international airport, which military sources attribute to a fire caused by a FAR attack against aircraft fuel depots at the airport.

Eyewitnesses told EFE that army planes also bombed a FAR base in the Kafuri neighborhood north of Khartoum.

cross accusations

Both the army and the FAR have it accused of violating the trucethe first of 24 hours since fighting began on Saturday, as well as attacking civilian facilities, including medical centers and markets in the capital and other regions of Sudan.

Army spokesman Colonel Nabil Abdullah once again accused the “rebel forces” of the FAR of having violated the truce, and of “move in small groups without a guide or plan” and “carry out looting operations in some neighborhoods of the capital and in the city of Merowe”, in the north of the country and on the border with Egypt.

He also stated that “for the fifth day in a row these rebel groups attacked the General Command (…) but they were defeated and suffered heavy lossesas well as the destruction of several combat vehicles,” the spokesman told Sudanese state television.

“It was easy from the beginning to bomb the concentrations of these rebel forces in the center of Khartoum and eliminate the rebellion in a few hours, but the armed forces cannot endanger the lives of the population”, added the spokesman and called the troops again of the FAR to surrender and surrender to the Armed Forces.

For its part, the FAR stated that the Army attacked our troops “with heavy weapons from the first hours of the truce, while the planes continued to attack civilian complexes, including hospitals”, as well as “water supply stations and electric”.

mass evacuations

Wednesday morning, thousands of people have begun to leave their homes in Khartoum, some by car and some on foot, including women and children. They commented that the streets were littered with corpses whose smell of decomposition filled the air.

Foreign governments have begun planning the evacuation of thousands of foreigners, including United Nations officials.

Japan announced Wednesday that its defense ministry had begun “necessary preparations” to evacuate about 60 of its nationals from Sudan, including embassy staff.

Serious health situation

health sources for their part they warned of the grave humanitarian situation in the country and warned that more than half of the hospitals in Khartoum and neighboring states are out of service, while the others risk closure due to lack of medical personnel and supplies due to the fighting.

“Of the 59 hospitals in the capital and states adjacent to conflict areas, there are 39 hospitals that are out of order,” the Sudan Doctors Union said this morning.

Of the hospitals that have stopped providing services, nine have been bombed and 16 others have been forcibly evicted, the union said, without blaming either side for these attacks.

So far, 20 hospitals are fully or partially operational, since some of them only provide first aid services, and are also ” threatened with closure due to lack of medical staffsupplies, water and electricity,” the source said.

Source: EFE and AFP