Two military factions in the Northeast-African country of Sudan are vying for supremacy, sparking fears of a civil war. Since a 2021 coup, the country has been led by a military junta.
According to reports, starting Saturday morning, April 15th, fierce fighting between the official Sudanese army and rival paramilitary organization Rapid Support Forces (RSF) broke out. At the time of writing, the fighting has claimed the lives of at least 69 civilians, including three UN workers, as well as dozens of military personnel, some of high rank.
For two days, Sudanese army fighter jets have been conducting airstrikes on RSF bases while the capital of Khartoum and other cities have been gripped by brutal urban warfare.
Amidst the chaos and confusion, both sides report having captured important sites, claims which, for now, are difficult to verify.
At the center of the power struggle are the country’s two most powerful men: army chief and de facto leader of Sudan, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, better known as Hemedti, leader of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), who until Saturday was second in command.
While the two commanders initially agreed to a three-hour pause in fighting from 4 p.m. local time to allow humanitarian evacuations requested by the UN, the deal fell through.
Sudanese politicians have launched several attempts to get the two generals to negotiate; thus far, all have proven fruitless.
Two of Sudan’s neighbors, Egypt and South Sudan, have offered to mediate, while the United Nations, the EU, China, Russia, the U.S., and Saudi Arabia have called for an immediate end to the fighting.
On Sunday, the Arab League held an emergency meeting, after which it issued a statement that emphasized the need for a return to peaceful negotiations and to “establish a new phase that fulfills the ambitions of the brotherly Sudanese people and contributes to reinforce political and economic security and stability in this important country.”
There is little hope that such appeals will be successful. RSF leader Dagalo remains staunchly committed to his opponent’s removal, calling him a “criminal” and a “liar.” Claiming he knew where his opponent was hiding, he promised that either he would get to him and hand him over to justice, or that he would die “just like any other dog.”
In ‘happier’ times, the two generals marched in lockstep. In 2019, their two armies sided with the people who were in revolt against dictator Omar Al-Bashir, which led to his ouster, ending a 30 years reign.
A ‘Sovereignty Council’, chaired by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and composed of military and civilians was subsequently formed. As a result, Burhan became the temporary leader of the country.
While the council served to put Sudan on the road to founding a democracy, in 2021, when power was planned to be relinquished, Burhan and Hamdan staged a coup together.
In recent months, however, the two generals had started to quarrel. Tensions over the RSF’s integration into the military had been simmering, which in turn delayed the formation of an internationally recognised democratic government.
Under Burhan’s command, the Sudanese army possesses the heaviest military hardware, including fighter jets. The RSF grew out of the notorious ‘janjaweed’ militias that operated in the rebel-held Darfur region between 2003 and 2008, a campaign in which Burhan and Hamdan both served then-president Bashir.
With Burhan being appointed as regional commander of the army, Hamdan headed up the ‘janjaweed,’ which was responsible for the worst massacres in Darfur, killing 300,000 and displacing millions more.
The success of this crackdown pleased President Bashir, prompting him in 2013 to create the RSF from these outfits, appointing Hamdan as its commander. The RSF became Bashir’s de facto private army, a kind of modern praetorian guard.
Perhaps unwisely, Bashir spared no expense as he provided the RSF with high-grade weaponry, which as a byproduct bestowed ever more power onto its commander. To date, Hamdan is considered one of the richest men in Sudan.
‘His’ RSF rapidly expanded, growing into an army of 100,000, and began offering its services as a military contractor to the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. It is also known to have occasionally partnered with the Russian Wagner Group.
Among Western powers, the U.S. in particular has a stake in what happens in Sudan. As revealed by the recently leaked Pentagon documents, Washington views Chinese and Russian influence on the African continent with increasing wariness.
Sudan, under its ruling military, in February successfully reviewed an agreement that would allow Russia to build a naval base in the Red Sea in exchange for weapons and equipment.
Before its ratification, a civilian government however had to be formed first. A prospect that, at least in the short term, seems highly unlikely.
