The measures to suppress the demonstrations since the October measures have resulted in the deaths of at least 60 people and a large number of injuries, according to the Central Committee of Sudan Doctors, allied with the protest movement.
The committee said that all of Thursday’s victims were demonstrators, and that they were killed by security men’s bullets to the head, thigh and chest in rallies in the cities of Bahri and Omdurman.
The demonstrators tried again to reach the presidential palace in Khartoum, in an effort to maintain pressure on the army, which halted the power-sharing that was negotiated after the overthrow of Omar al-Bashir’s rule in 2019.
In Omdurman, where a number of protesters were killed last week, a protester said that security forces fired live bullets and tear gas, and ran over a number of protesters with armored vehicles.
The Ministry of Health in Khartoum State said that security forces raided the Al-Arbaeen Hospital in Omdurman, attacked the medical staff and wounded demonstrators. She added that the forces surrounded the Khartoum Teaching Hospital and fired tear gas inside it.
In Bahri, a witness saw forces using tear gas and stun grenades, with some bombs falling on homes and a school while preventing protesters from reaching the bridge leading to Khartoum.
60 people arrested
The Sudanese police said in a statement, “The demonstrations witnessed a deviation from peacefulness and cases of encroachment and violence by some demonstrators towards the forces present,” noting that there were injuries among the police and armed forces.
The statement added that three people were arrested on charges of killing citizens in Omdurman, and that “60 suspects were arrested” in total.
Internet and mobile phone services have been largely cut off since the morning, as happened in previous protests.
Most of the bridges linking Khartoum with the cities of Bahri and Omdurman were closed. Pictures of protests in other cities, including Gedaref, Kosti and Madani, were published on social media.
The Forces for Freedom and Change coalition, which was sharing power with the army before the October measures, demanded that the United Nations Security Council conduct an investigation into what it described as “premeditated killings and attacks on hospitals”.
Thursday’s rallies are the first in a number of rounds of protest planned this month, and come four days after Abdullah Hamdouk’s resignation as prime minister.
Hamdok took office in 2019 and oversaw major economic reforms before being dismissed by the army chief, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and then reinstated in a failed attempt to salvage the power-sharing agreement.
Diplomatic moves
Lieutenant-General Shams El-Din Kabbashi, a member of the Transitional Sovereignty Council, discussed Thursday with the US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Molly Fe, the overall developments and complexities of the current situation in the country, following Hamdok’s resignation from his position.
During a telephone conversation with the US official, a member of the Sovereignty Council gave a detailed explanation of the complexities of the situation and the ongoing efforts to resolve it through a comprehensive dialogue between the political forces and other components of the country.
In a statement issued by the Transitional Sovereign Council, Kabbashi expressed his hope that the dialogue would lead to a national consensus on managing the remainder of the transitional period, and agreeing on the appropriate mechanism for nominating a new prime minister and forming an executive government as soon as possible to fill the long vacuum in the executive body.
He stressed the need to hold free and fair elections at the end of the transitional period, after which the country’s administration will receive an elected civilian government.
For her part, the US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs affirmed the United States’ readiness to support a Sudanese-led dialogue with international facilitation to reach a national consensus that does not exclude anyone and ensures the participation of women and youth groups.
She stressed her country’s support for the holding of free and fair elections at the end of the transitional period, transferring power to an elected civilian government.
Kabbashi and the US official agreed that peaceful demonstrations are a guaranteed right for the Sudanese people, with the obligation not to harm the people’s public and private property.
With regard to dealing with the demonstrations, the two sides agreed, during the phone conversation, on the necessity of reviewing and developing methods of dealing with them, emphasizing the conduct of a transparent investigation into the abuses that accompanied them and holding those responsible to account.
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