Airstrikes rock Sudan after failed ceasefire negotiations

2023-05-08 15:17:11, Kosova & Bota CNA

Airstrikes again rocked Sudan's capital on May 8, as recent ceasefire talks in Jeddah failed to materialise. A Saudi diplomat said both sides consider themselves "capable of winning the battle".

Fighting in Sudan began on April 15 between the forces of army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his rival-turned-deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who heads the paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF).

Since then, the fighting has left hundreds of people dead, thousands injured and millions more trapped inside their homes amid severe shortages of water, food and other basic goods.

The generals have sent representatives to Saudi Arabia to negotiate a humanitarian ceasefire in an effort supported by the United States, but these negotiations have so far been fruitless.

As of Monday, the talks had made "no major progress," a Saudi diplomat told AFP news agency, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"A permanent truce is not on the table... Each side believes it is capable of winning the battle," added the diplomat.

"There is danger everywhere"

The fighting has caused a mass exodus of foreigners and Sudanese through flights, sea journeys and difficult land journeys to Egypt, Chad, South Sudan and other neighboring countries.

"There is danger everywhere," said Rawaa Hamad, who escaped from Port Sudan on an evacuation flight to Qatar on Monday carrying 71 people.

In Sudan, she said, there is "no security at all right now, unfortunately," as citizens are forced to live with "a lack of everything - a lack of water, a lack of fuel, a lack of medicine, even a lack of hospitals and doctors." .

Mediation efforts

Saudi Arabia is working to establish "a timeline for extended negotiations to achieve a permanent cessation of hostilities," its foreign ministry said.

The talks in Jeddah, which will continue "in the coming days", aim to achieve "an effective short-term halt" to the fighting, to facilitate the distribution of aid and the restoration of basic services, the Arab ministry said in a statement.

Since mid-April, multiple ceasefire agreements have been announced and quickly broken in the poverty-stricken country, which also has a long history of instability./ VOA