Negotiations for a ceasefire in Sudan have failed again for the time being. The Sudanese army and the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which have been fighting each other in the Horn of Africa country for more than six months, failed to agree on a ceasefire during US- and Saudi-brokered talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia . This was announced by the Saudi Foreign Ministry.
Representatives of the parties to the conflict, however, agreed to negotiate together to reduce barriers to access for humanitarian aid in a framework led by the UN emergency relief office OCHA.
In Sudan, the RSF of former deputy ruler Mohammed Hamdan Daglo, a quasi-army that emerged from militias in the Darfur region, has been fighting since mid-April against the armed forces led by de facto head of state Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. In the first months of the conflict, ceasefires were agreed upon and broken several times. Both sides blamed each other.
Concern about the situation in Darfur
Meanwhile, violence continued both in Sudan’s capital Khartoum and in the Darfur region in the west of the country. The RSF has continued to expand its power in Darfur in recent weeks and most recently announced on Saturday that it had captured the capital of the state of West Darfur, Al-Junaina. Experts are concerned about a renewed escalation of violence against the civilian population. Suspected war crimes had already occurred in Al-Junaina in the summer. According to the UN, mass graves containing several dozen murdered civilians from the Masalit ethnic minority were found there in June. The RSF denied the allegations.
Darfur has been one of the country’s most serious conflicts for over 20 years. The conflicts that have been simmering for years between ethnic minorities such as the Masalit and the RSF militias of Arab origin have now escalated again due to the power struggle.
Before the conflict, Sudan had a population of around 48 million. According to UN estimates, around 5.8 million people have been displaced since April, of which around 4.6 million are on the move within the country. According to surveys by the conflict data organization ACLED, more than 10,000 people were killed.