Sudan's armed forces express readiness to extend ceasefire with RSF

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
29 May 2023 20:41
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Although both sides have repeatedly accused each other of violating the truce, Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on Saturday said they were ready to talk about the extension of the ceasefire.

An aerial view shows black smoke rising above the Khartoum International Airport in Khartoum, Sudan, on April 20, 2023 (AFP)

The special representative of the head of the Sudanese military Dafallah Al-Haj Ali said on Monday that Sudan's regular armed forces are ready to extend the ceasefire which was agreed on May 20 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and is due to expire on Monday.

"We agree to extend the ceasefire and we do not seek war," he told Al Jazeera, noting that all efforts are mobilized towards a humanitarian truce and that Sudan's military is capable of resolving the crisis.

Although both sides have repeatedly accused each other of violating the truce, Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on Saturday said they were ready to talk about the extension of the ceasefire.

The one-week truce was breached only minutes after it was put into effect on Monday night, with residents of the capital Khartoum reporting airstrikes and artillery fire rocking the city.

Clashes erupted on April 15 between army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and his former deputy Mohammad Hamdan Dagalo, who leads the RSF. Latest figures from the World Health Organization (WHO) reveal that 702 people have been killed and 5,687 wounded in the clashes.

Earlier in the day, a BBC article tackling the progress of the conflict in Sudan reports that entire villages west of the capital have been pillaged by the warring parties: referencing satellite images as visual evidence of the dire situation in Sudan.

One satellite image shows the entirety of Abu Adam, a village south of Darfur, scorched by the combat fire between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group.

Nyala, which borders Abu Adam, has been suffering from intermittent electricity cuts, due to fuel scarcity, cutting off the locals almost completely from the outside world.

BBC columnist, Barbara Plett-Usher, managed to get input from a local journalist Essa Daffallah.

"The RSF stormed the city with dozens of pickup trucks mounted with guns, and a large number of motorbikes," he said, adding that on Friday 19 May, "NGO offices and shops were looted."

"The hospital was emptied because it was in the fighting zone, most of the pharmacies were looted. All the residential areas in Nyala have been completely sealed off by barricades and digging ditches so that the militias can't enter the residential districts."

A local activist, also, estimated that more than 600,000 internally displaced individuals who relied exclusively on humanitarian aid have received no assistance for the past month because of the heated clashes.