Khartoum: Deployments and bridges to the Sudanese armed forces were closed on Saturday ahead of planned anti-coup rallies, two days after the military formed a ruling council that excludes the country’s main civilian bloc.
The demonstrations come nearly three weeks after top general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan toppled the government, detained civilian leadership and ordered a state of emergency.
The October 25 takeover of the army drew widespread international condemnation and led to street demonstrations by people demanding the restoration of the country’s democratic transition.
Any hopes of his army’s withdrawal were dashed on Thursday, however, when Burhan named himself as the head of a new ruling sovereign council, drawing further condemnation from the West.
Ahead of the new demonstrations expected on Saturday, large numbers of army, police and paramilitary forces were deployed in Khartoum and bridges connecting the capital to neighboring cities were sealed, AFP reporters told AFP.
They also blocked roads leading to the army headquarters in Khartoum, the site of a mass sit-in in 2019 that led to the ouster of the autocratic president. Omar al-Bashiro, the reporters said.
NS United Nations Calling on Sudanese security forces to refrain from violence ahead of Saturday’s protests.
“In light of yesterday’s demonstrations in Sudan, I once again call on security forces to exercise utmost restraint and respect the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression,” the UN Special Representative said. Sudan Volker Perth.
Saturday’s planned demonstrations largely organized by informal groups known as “resistance committees” have sprung up in neighborhoods and towns across the country. Anti Bashir performance in 2019
The committees have called for several protests since the coup and mobilized via text messages as Sudan remains largely under a harsh internet outage caused by intermittent disruption of phone lines.
But despite efforts, “civilian opposition to the coup has spread and fractured”, Jonas Horner The International Crisis Group said in a report last week.
At least 15 people have died in crackdowns on the demonstrations, according to an independent union of medics, which has led to punitive measures by the international community.
Military figures and new civilian members of the new ruling council were sworn in on Friday, following Burhan’s formation a day earlier.
Three former rebel leaders who were members of the deposed Sovereign Council and were appointed to the new, but did not attend the ceremony. He had previously rejected a military coup.
The newly named council introduces a number of new and little-known figures to represent the citizens.
But it does not include any members of the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC), an umbrella coalition that led the 2019 anti-Bashir protests, and called for the transition to main bloc civilian rule.
The United Nations has criticized the military’s latest “unilateral” move, while Western countries have said it “complicates Sudan’s efforts to get its democratic transition back on track”.
“The Troika (Norway, the United Kingdom, the United States), the European Union and Switzerland are seriously concerned by the alleged appointment of the Sovereign Council of Sudan,” he said on Friday.
The statement called for the reinstatement of Prime Minister Abdullah Hamdok, who was briefly detained and later placed under house arrest following a military takeover.
Since seizing power, Burhan has seen sweeping changes in a number of areas, including education and banking, which were seen by many in Sudan as a way to consolidate military control.
He stressed that the army’s move on 25 October was “not a coup” but a push to “correct the course of the transition” as factional infighting and divisions among civilians from the FFC and the military under the now-deposed government deepened. happened.
The demonstrations come nearly three weeks after top general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan toppled the government, detained civilian leadership and ordered a state of emergency.
The October 25 takeover of the army drew widespread international condemnation and led to street demonstrations by people demanding the restoration of the country’s democratic transition.
Any hopes of his army’s withdrawal were dashed on Thursday, however, when Burhan named himself as the head of a new ruling sovereign council, drawing further condemnation from the West.
Ahead of the new demonstrations expected on Saturday, large numbers of army, police and paramilitary forces were deployed in Khartoum and bridges connecting the capital to neighboring cities were sealed, AFP reporters told AFP.
They also blocked roads leading to the army headquarters in Khartoum, the site of a mass sit-in in 2019 that led to the ouster of the autocratic president. Omar al-Bashiro, the reporters said.
NS United Nations Calling on Sudanese security forces to refrain from violence ahead of Saturday’s protests.
“In light of yesterday’s demonstrations in Sudan, I once again call on security forces to exercise utmost restraint and respect the right to peaceful assembly and freedom of expression,” the UN Special Representative said. Sudan Volker Perth.
Saturday’s planned demonstrations largely organized by informal groups known as “resistance committees” have sprung up in neighborhoods and towns across the country. Anti Bashir performance in 2019
The committees have called for several protests since the coup and mobilized via text messages as Sudan remains largely under a harsh internet outage caused by intermittent disruption of phone lines.
But despite efforts, “civilian opposition to the coup has spread and fractured”, Jonas Horner The International Crisis Group said in a report last week.
At least 15 people have died in crackdowns on the demonstrations, according to an independent union of medics, which has led to punitive measures by the international community.
Military figures and new civilian members of the new ruling council were sworn in on Friday, following Burhan’s formation a day earlier.
Three former rebel leaders who were members of the deposed Sovereign Council and were appointed to the new, but did not attend the ceremony. He had previously rejected a military coup.
The newly named council introduces a number of new and little-known figures to represent the citizens.
But it does not include any members of the Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC), an umbrella coalition that led the 2019 anti-Bashir protests, and called for the transition to main bloc civilian rule.
The United Nations has criticized the military’s latest “unilateral” move, while Western countries have said it “complicates Sudan’s efforts to get its democratic transition back on track”.
“The Troika (Norway, the United Kingdom, the United States), the European Union and Switzerland are seriously concerned by the alleged appointment of the Sovereign Council of Sudan,” he said on Friday.
The statement called for the reinstatement of Prime Minister Abdullah Hamdok, who was briefly detained and later placed under house arrest following a military takeover.
Since seizing power, Burhan has seen sweeping changes in a number of areas, including education and banking, which were seen by many in Sudan as a way to consolidate military control.
He stressed that the army’s move on 25 October was “not a coup” but a push to “correct the course of the transition” as factional infighting and divisions among civilians from the FFC and the military under the now-deposed government deepened. happened.
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