Sudan risks falling into civil war

Sudan’s army chief on Monday branded the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) a rebellious group and ordered it be dissolved, the foreign ministry said, as the faction battled the army in the capital and across the country.

The order follows a violent power struggle that has killed at least 97 civilians and injured 365 since the fighting started early on Saturday, according to a toll published by the Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors, an activist group. The government has not published a toll.

Bombardments and airstrikes rocked Khartoum on Monday, including near the military headquarters, and in Bahri just across the Nile River near another base, witnesses in the areas said. Smoke billowed from the runway of the capital’s international airport, where explosions and fires were visible on TV images.

The rare outbreak of violence in the capital has also spread to other parts of Sudan, pitting the armed forces against the RSF, a former militia that had been due to merge with the army and whose leaders shared power in a ruling military council.

Army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan heads the ruling council while RSF leader General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti, is his deputy. Both sides said they had made gains on Monday.

A protracted power struggle raises the risk of Sudan falling into civil war four years after long-ruling Omar al-Bashir was toppled in an uprising, as well as derailing an internationally-backed framework deal to launch a civilian transition that was due to be signed earlier this month.

Sudan has been affected by rising levels of hunger in recent years as an economic crisis has deepened. The WFP says it reached 9.3 million people in Sudan, one of its largest operations globally.