Sudan’s warring sides ‘agree seven-day ceasefire’

The South Sudanese foreign ministry, which made the announcement, says the ceasefire will take effect from Thursday.

Sudan’s warring factions have agreed in principle to a seven-day ceasefire from Thursday, neighboring South Sudan announced, as more airstrikes and shootings in the Khartoum region disrupted the last short-term truce.

In a statement released on Tuesday by South Sudan’s foreign ministry, which had offered to mediate the conflict, President Salva Kiir stressed the importance of extending the ceasefire and appointing envoys for peace talks that would enable both sides to had agreed.

The credibility of the reported May 4-11 ceasefire agreement between Sudanese army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) leader General Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo was unclear , given the rampant violations that undermined previous current agreements. from 24 to 72 hours.

“Previously, we had a three-day ceasefire, followed by another three-day ceasefire, followed by a three-day ceasefire extension. This should last seven days. Both sides have agreed that they will have a ceasefire and that they will not fire unless they are shot at or unless there is military movement. All ceasefires have been conditional,” said Hiba Morgan of Al Jazeera in Khartoum.

“The two sides say they have agreed to hold talks, but we have repeatedly heard from the military that there are conditions attached to these talks. The Rapid Support Forces have said the same thing,” Morgan added.

The war in Sudan has forced 100,000 people to flee across borders and the fighting, now entering its third week, is creating a humanitarian crisis, UN officials said earlier on Tuesday.

The conflict threatens to turn into a bigger disaster as Sudan’s neighbors grapple with a refugee crisis and fighting hampers the delivery of aid in a country where two-thirds of the people already depend on outside aid.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi said Cairo would support dialogue in Sudan between the rival factions, but was also “careful not to interfere in their internal affairs”.

“The whole region could be affected,” he said in an interview with a Japanese newspaper on Tuesday, when an envoy for the Sudanese army chief, who heads one of the warring factions, met with Egyptian officials in Cairo.

United Nations officials had said UN relief chief Martin Griffiths planned to visit Sudan on Tuesday, but the timing was yet to be confirmed.

The UN’s World Food Program said on Monday it was resuming work in safer parts of the country after a lull earlier in the conflict that left some WFP workers dead.

“The risk is that this will become not just a Sudan crisis, but a regional crisis,” said Michael Dunford, WFP’s director for East Africa.

Army and RSF commanders, who had shared power as part of an internationally supported transition to free elections and civilian government, have shown no signs of backing down, but neither seems capable of a quick victory.

That has raised the specter of a protracted conflict that could attract outside powers.