No end in sight to widening gulf in Sudan
The Sudan
conflict could, in time, splinter into battles between tribes, clans, and
faiths.
Published :
Jun 02, 2023 16:13 IST - 17 MINS READ
TALMIZ AHMAD/ Frontline
The
conflict in Sudan, which began in April, has already claimed over 700 lives,
caused over 5,000 injuries, displaced nearly a million people, and compelled
over 200,000 to seek refuge in neighbouring countries. As there are no signs of
a ceasefire, the country’s 45 million people, already experiencing severe food
insecurity, are likely to suffer a grave humanitarian crisis due to
displacement, economic hardships, and constant fear of being caught in the
crossfire of the country’s armed forces fighting for power and wealth.
The destruction is not just at
home; the regions of the Sahel in the west and the Horn of Africa in the
southeast are vulnerable to the effects of this war and face the threat of
refugees, economic privation, and the prospect of a regional conflagration.
Popular anger was ignited in
Sudan in late 2018 following a government decision to triple the price of goods
when the country was experiencing inflation of 70 per cent and an acute
shortage of foreign currency. When the then President Omar al-Bashir, in power
for over 30 years, refused to step down, the opposition groups formed a
coalition in December 2018 and launched fierce demonstrations against the
government. The security forces responded with harsh measures in which many
people were killed. On April 11, 2019, the country’s armed forces declared that
the President had been overthrown. The army then ran the country through a
Transitional Military Council.
As agitations continued, the
army declared a state of emergency and attacked demonstrators, killing over a
hundred of them. The protests ended with two agreements in July and August 2019
between the army and the “Forces for Freedom and Change” (FCC), an alliance of
the groups organising the public protests. Under these agreements, a joint
military-civilian “Sovereignty Council” was created; it would be initially
headed by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the army chief, and Abdalla Hamdok,
the civilian Prime Minister, would succeed him in November 2021.
However, on October 25, 2021,
General al-Burhan overthrew the Sovereignty Council and detained the Prime
Minister and his ministerial colleagues. Al-Burhan claimed that it was a
“course correction” to weed out elements that were hostile to the army. The
people responded with protests, in which another hundred or so were killed.
In November 2021, al-Burhan
announced a new Sovereignty Council headed by himself and named as his deputy
General Mohammed Hamadan Dagalo, head of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a
militia group. The generals were anxious to retain power to avoid an
investigation into the killings of the pro-democracy agitators and the
commercial assets controlled by the armed forces and the RSF.
Al-Burhan comes from a
traditional military background and was closely associated with Omar
al-Bashir’s regime. He saw action in the conflicts in Darfur and South Sudan
and rapidly ascended the promotion ladder, becoming a lieutenant general in
2019.
Dagalo,
popularly known as Hemedti, has a different background. A native of the Darfur
province, Dagalo was drafted by al-Bashir to become part of the
“Janjaweed”militants, an Arab fighting force which, from 2003, carried out
lethal attacks on Africans in the breakaway province. The Janjaweed are
believed to have caused the deaths of several hundred thousand non-Arab
civilians and the displacement of about two million people. These militia were
consolidated into the Rapid Support Forces in 2013 to combat rebel groups in
the Darfur region as well as in the states of South Kordofan and the Blue Nile.
Dagalo was named the head of the RSF, with his brother as the deputy head.
Starting
with about 5,000 fighters in 2014, the RSF’s present strength is estimated at
100,000. The RSF was accused of the killing of numerous pro-democracy
demonstrators in 2019. Foreign
Policy magazine
commentator Jerome Tubiana, writing in May 2019, presciently described the RSF
under Dagalo as a “monster it [the Bashir regime] cannot control and who
represents a security threat not only for Sudan but also for its neighbours”.
In 2021, with the two generals
now in charge, Sudan’s brief hopes for a democratic order abruptly ended.
However, the people’s torment was not over.
The military coup ended debt
relief and development assistance from foreign sources, which led to a serious
economic crisis—inflation crossed 200 per cent, the currency depreciated, and
water and electricity supplies deteriorated. The Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO) warned of a food crisis affecting a third of Sudan’s
population.
Two different opposition groups
The
opposition to the generals also consolidated itself. It consisted of two groups,
both of which sought an end to military rule, but differed on tactics.
“Resistance Committees”, located in different parts of the country, rejected
all accommodation with the military leaders and insisted on three “No’s”: no
negotiation, no compromise, no partnership. The other group, the Forces of
Freedom and Change (FCC) adopted a pragmatic approach and accepted the need to
work with the armed forces and gradually move towards civilian rule and
democracy.
During this period, the US and
Saudi Arabia worked behind the scenes to obtain compromise arrangements between
the army and sections of the opposition. These efforts culminated in the
“Framework Political Agreement” of December 5, 2022. It called for a new
governing authority that would be civilian and democratic, without involving
the armed forces. It also placed al-Burhan and Dagalo on par with each other
under a civilian president, thus providing a significant boost to the militia
leader.
The agreement called for the
merger of the RSF with the army; al-Burhan proposed that it should be completed
in two years, while Dagalo favoured a 10-year period. Finally, the agreement
called on the armed forces and the RSF to withdraw from all commercial
activity: the army then controlled over 200 enterprises, while Dagalo
controlled the country’s gold mines.
Within a few weeks of the pact’s
signing, commentators began to note its shortcomings. No observer believed that
Dagalo would merge his forces with the national army or give up control over
the gold mines. Sudanese commentator Kholood Khair said that, following the
agreement, her country would “take a step further away from civilian rule and
closer to potential civil war”. Democracy activist Amal Hamdan recalled
Dagalo’s role in “overseeing torture, extrajudicial killings, and mass rapes in
Darfur, the Blue Nile and South Kordofan states”, and, with heavy irony,
suggested that Dagalo could stand for president as a civilian.
Khartoum becomes a battleground
The
pessimists were proved correct. The April 11 deadline to begin implementing the
transition to civilian rule was not met. On April 15, the RSF launched surprise
attacks on army bases across the country. Khartoum was a major battleground,
with attacks on civilians and even diplomats across the capital. The army also
attacked RSF militants at the airport—several aircraft were destroyed and
airport buildings were set on fire. The UN described the violence as a “trail
of criminality”. Observers were particularly harsh on the RSF whose fighters
were seen as “undisciplined rabble” inside Khartoum, more interested in
ransacking and looting homes than in fighting.
Clashes also took place in the
provinces of Darfur, North Kordofan, and Blue Nile. The conflict has been
particularly fierce in Darfur, which seems to be witnessing a repeat of the
Arab versus African bloodletting of two decades ago that left 300,000 dead.
North Kordofan’s capital El Obeid is on the Khartoum-Darfur route and has an
airstrip that has enabled al-Burhan to use the air force against the RSF.
The US and Saudi Arabia mounted
a major diplomatic effort for a truce: representatives of the warring sides met
in Jeddah and, after prolonged discussions, announced on May 11 a framework
agreement to protect civilians and allow the flow of humanitarian aid into the
country. A US official said, “This is not a ceasefire” but added that it could
be the “first step” in ending the fighting.
The war has already caused a
humanitarian crisis: by early May, 42,000 Sudanese refugees had reached Egypt,
30,000 were in Chad, 27,000 had escaped to South Sudan, nearly 10,000 had
sought refuge in Ethiopia, and another 6,000 were in the Central African
Republic. These numbers have been rising by the day.
On May 20, following peace talks
in Jeddah brokered by the US and Saudi Arabia, Sudan’s two fighting factions
announced a ceasefire that would take effect from May 22. However, since then,
there are reports of continued fighting in the country.
Highlights
- With
no signs of a suspension of hostilities in Sudan, the entire regions of
the Sahel in the west and the Horn of Africa in the east are vulnerable to
the effects of the war.
- In 2023, civil war broke out and by early May, 42,000 Sudanese
refugees had reached Egypt, 30,000 were in Chad, 27,000 had escaped to
South Sudan, nearly 10,000 had sought refuge in Ethiopia, and another
6,000 were in the Central African Republic.
- US negotiators had failed to read the
situation accurately when they finalised a Framework Political Agreement
in December 2022 that called for the merger of the army and the RSF,
without recognising the animosity that divided the two leaders.
Influence of external players
As the
horrors of Sudan’s civil conflict unfold, there is increasing focus on the
external players who have brought the country to this sorry state.
Sudan borders seven
countries—Egypt, Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic, South Sudan,
Ethiopia and Eritrea—and has an 850-km coastline on the Red Sea. The Blue and
White Nile rivers merge in Sudan, providing the country with access to 60 per
cent of the Nile River Basin. This is crucial for the well-being of Sudan and
also of Egypt, 90 per cent of whose 110 million people depend on the Nile for
fresh water.
Sudan is also an integral part
of the dynamics of the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea. The core countries in
the Horn are Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, and Djibouti; Sudan and South Sudan
are also included within the Horn as the political and economic interests of
these countries flow beyond their borders.
These countries are of unique
strategic importance as they straddle the Red Sea (though Ethiopia is separated
from the sea by a narrow sliver of Eritrean territory). This 2,000-km waterway,
with an average width of 280 km, connects the economies of Asia with those of
Europe and North Africa, and then, across the Atlantic, with North and South
America. The Red Sea waterway is at the heart of global trade—19,000 ships
cross it annually, transporting 12 per cent of global trade and over 6.5
million barrels of crude oil, distillates and other hydrocarbon products.
The Horn of Africa and the Red
Sea are now also at the centre of regional and global competition. First,
following the Arab Spring uprisings in Yemen, Saudi Arabia had concerns about
Iranian influence in the country with which it shares a 1,400-km border. These
were based on Iran’s sectarian affiliation with the dissident group, the
Houthis, and its military support to the group. Linked with this were Saudi
fears relating to Iran’s naval activity in the Red Sea and its quest for bases
in the Horn. From March 2015, a Saudi-led coalition launched air and land
attacks in Yemen, bringing the Saudi-Iran divide to the Red Sea region.
The other competition has
emerged from Saudi-UAE estrangement from Qatar and Türkiye from 2017. Saudi
Arabia, the UAE, and Türkiye have not only deployed naval forces in the Red Sea
but have also sought to control ports and islands on both sides of the sea.
Besides the reverberations of
Gulf competition in the Red Sea littoral, the major global powers—the US,
France, the UK, Japan, and China—have also made the Horn a zone for strategic
competition by deploying their navies in the western Indian Ocean and the Red
Sea and supporting their naval vessels through bases in the Horn and the Gulf.
As a result of these regional
and big power rivalries, the Horn, the Red Sea, and the Gulf littoral now
constitute an integrated security landscape marked by domestic upheavals,
cross-border conflicts and interventions by regional and extra-regional states,
with political rivalries being aggravated by periodic lethal domestic and
transnational upheavals.
The ongoing conflict in Sudan is
the result of these rivalries and will also, over time, adversely affect
regional stability.
At a glance
The firing never ceased
The warring sides accused each
other of violating the ceasefire the US and Saudi Arabia negotiated. The
violations happened only minutes after the one-week truce came into effect on
May 22, with residents of Khartoum reporting air strikes and artillery fire. The
ceasefire agreement was meant to allow for much-needed humanitarian aid to
reach the war-ravaged parts of the northeast African country. It is the latest
of a series of truces that have all been systematically violated.
Looming hunger crisis
Food manufacturing sites have
been destroyed, aid warehouses looted, and markets razed in Sudan’s five-week
conflict, according to satellite imagery analysed by Bloomberg, fuelling a
growing humanitarian crisis that has left roughly 20 million people in need of
assistance.
Danger and despair
Since the conflict broke out,
more than 900,000 people have fled their homes. But millions remain trapped in
Khartoum and its sister cities of Bahri and Omdurman, unable to leave the
central battleground. If every day is a struggle for them to find food, water
and charge phones, on the streets they also have to contend with fighters and
criminals who rob and brutalise pedestrians, loot shops and storm into homes to
steal whatever of value they can find.
Struggles for refugees
From the scorching summer heat
to war profiteers and bureaucratic foot-dragging, Sudanese fleeing the battle
have encountered many obstacles—but also help from strangers—on the long road
to safety in Egypt. Among the hundreds of families waiting at the border, some
had no passports. Others would not go further until their husband, brother or
son was granted a visa—which women and children are exempt from.
Regional rivalries
Ideological
rivalries that emerged in West Asia in the wake of the Arab Spring uprisings
from 2011 placed Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt in opposition to Qatar and
Türkiye that espoused political Islam and backed the Muslim Brotherhood. Saudi
Arabia and the UAE worked with the armed forces in Egypt to bring down the
Islamist government of Mohamed Morsi in 2013. They then initiated a political,
economic, and diplomatic blockade of Qatar in 2017. Qatar was supported by
Türkiye, which sent a military detachment to the country to prevent a coup
against the Qatari emir.
These rivalries were reflected
in Sudan. The regime of Omar al-Bashir, with its Islamist inclinations, was
close to Qatar and Türkiye. However, as Sudan lost 75 per cent of its oil
reserves after the secession of South Sudan in 2013, it reached out to Saudi
Arabia and the UAE for financial assistance. It also deployed troops in Yemen
in support of the Saudi-led coalition. In return, Sudan obtained funding to
subsidise basic commodities, direct deposits into its treasury, and payments of
its soldiers’ salaries. By 2018, the UAE had injected about $7 billion into the
Sudanese economy.
However, al-Bashir lost
credibility with his Saudi and Emirati patrons as he refused to cut ties with
Qatar; they feared that he had retained his Islamist affiliations. Hence, in
the face of the popular uprisings against him in 2018-19, he received no Gulf
support and was overthrown in the military coup led by al-Burhan and Dagalo.
Since then, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in association with Egypt led by General
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, have emerged as the most influential external players in
Sudan’s domestic politics. They backed the generals in foiling the transition
to civilian rule and supported their stay in power despite the strong democracy
movement. According to reports, the two GCC members provided $200 million a
month in cash and commodity subsidies in the second half of 2019.
As Saudi Arabia became less
active, the UAE came to play the principal role in Sudanese affairs. It
enriched Dagalo by facilitating the transfer of revenues from his gold sales to
banks in the UAE. This was done through Meroe Gold, a subsidiary of Russia’s
Wagner Group, which is based in Sudan. The UAE also promoted ties between
Dagalo and the Wagner Group in Libya as well as with Khalifa Haftar, head of
the UAE-supported Libyan National Army.
Egypt has chosen a side
Since 2022,
Egypt supports al-Burhan in the rivalry between him and Dagalo, seeing the
regular army as the main source of stability in Arab states. Observers point
out that al-Burhan has been backing Egypt against Ethiopia on the issue of the
Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam that Egypt fears will reduce water flow to the
country. There are reports that Egyptian aircraft have bombed RSF positions in
the ongoing conflict and that the Egyptian armed forces are providing the army
with intelligence and ground support.
Region of
strategic importance
Sudan has an 850 km coastline on
the Red Sea and borders seven countries—Egypt, Libya, Chad, the Central African
Republic, South Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Sudan is an integral part of the
dynamics of the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea.
The 2,000-km Red Sea waterway
connects the economies of Asia with those of Europe and North Africa, and then,
across the Atlantic, with North and South America.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and
Turkey have not only deployed naval forces in the Red Sea but have also sought
to control ports and islands on both sides.
The US, France, the UK, Japan,
and China have made the Horn a zone for strategic competition by deploying
their navies in the western Indian Ocean and the Red Sea and supporting their
naval vessels through bases in the Horn and the Gulf.
[Inserted by the author]
The UAE, on the other hand,
supports Dagalo. In the early stages of the present conflict, after his forces captured
200 Egyptian military personnel at Meroe airport in north Sudan, the UAE
facilitated their release and return to Cairo.
The UAE sees Sudan as part of
the network of ports and islands that it seeks to control in the Red Sea and
the Horn of Africa to enhance its strategic and commercial interests across the
western Indian Ocean. Accordingly, in December 2022, the UAE and Sudan signed
an agreement for two UAE companies to construct a new port, Abu Amama port, on
Sudan’s Red Sea coast. The UAE’s partner in the Libyan conflict, the Wagner
Group is reported to have offered weaponry, including surface-to-air missiles,
to Dagalo. Interestingly, UAE companies are managing Dagalo’s social media to
improve his national image and portray him as a moderate and a patriot in Sudan
and in selected western capitals.
While Saudi Arabia and the UAE
have been playing lead roles in Sudan before and after the ongoing conflict,
the US has largely been on the sidelines. The main criticism of US diplomacy
has been that, despite the rhetoric of the Biden administration about promoting
democracy, American diplomats’ initiatives have backed the generals’ roles in
national politics at the expense of the democracy movement.
Justin
Lynch wrote in Foreign
Policy that,
after the fall of Omar al-Bashir, “hope for democracy was lost in Sudan” when
the US pushed for a joint military-civilian transitional constitution that
provided for the military to run the country for the first 21 months. The US
failed to see that the generals had no interest in subordinating themselves to
civilian rule.
US negotiators again failed to
read the situation accurately when they finalised the Framework Political
Agreement, not recognising the conflicting interests and deep animosity that
divided the army and the RSF and their leaders.
Finally, US officials failed to
anticipate that the generals’ rivalry would so quickly lead to a vicious
conflict that would make the capital a war zone, put millions of citizens at
risk, and expose thousands of American and other foreign officials and
civilians to crossfire from air attacks, mortar attacks, and street fighting.
In retrospect, it would appear
that the US had a very limited agenda in Sudan—to promote “normalisation”
between the country and Israel. For this, it needed the generals to be in power
rather than members of the democracy movement. Both Sudan and the region are
paying a very heavy price for this short-sighted approach.
Evenly divided armed forces
With the
two forces evenly placed in terms of manpower and firepower, and the generals
getting the sense that this is an existential conflict for them, there are no
prospects of a ceasefire in the near future. Sudan will most probably resemble
Syria and Yemen in terms of experiencing a prolonged conflict, extraordinary
death, destruction and displacement, heavy flow of weaponry, and continuous
interference of foreign powers in national affairs. Again, in line with the
Syrian and Yemeni precedents, there will be no clear outcome on the
battlefield.
National unity will be difficult
to maintain: even if the army pushes the RSF out of Khartoum, the latter will
consolidate itself in its home areas of Darfur and even link up with its ethnic
brethren across the border in Chad, as also with Haftar’s forces in Libya.
Recalling the earlier civil conflicts in South Sudan and Darfur, the simple
army versus RSF binary could splinter over time and conflicts between tribes,
clans, and faiths could emerge. This will give rise to warlords controlling
small pieces of territory, which will become hubs for trafficking of drugs,
small arms, and human beings.
The
breakdown of the state will also encourage the proliferation of extremist
elements, as was the case with Somalia; this precedent also affirms that they
will play a destructive role in their own country as well as across the region
and will not be easily exterminated.
Sudan’s neighbourhood will be
crippled economically by the influx of thousands of refugees. This will soon
have political implications in the region that is already defined by
authoritarian rule, fragile state order, weak economies, and periodic civil and
transborder conflicts, which could bring in regional players and even big
powers. Widespread instability will define the Horn and the Red Sea region.
This lethal breakdown of state
order in Africa’s third largest country is the result of the ambitions of two
generals, each of whom is backed by foreign interests seeking an advantage for
themselves in this cauldron of greed and animosity. Neither the domestic nor
external players have any regard for Sudan’s nascent democratic movement that
had hoped to replace the country’s authoritarian order with civilian control
over governance.
The movement now lies betrayed
and defeated in the dustbin of failed expectations, while the dance of death
continues without hindrance.
(Talmiz Ahmad, a former diplomat, holds the Ram
Sathe Chair for International studies, Symbiosis International University,
Pune; his recent book, West Asia at War: Repression, Resistance and Great
Power Games, was
published in April 2022.)
