ADDIS ABABA: Sudan’s government refused Monday to attend a regional meeting aimed at ending nearly three months of intense fighting, accusing Kenya, which chaired the negotians, of favoring the rival paramilitaries.
A power struggle between the army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, the head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, spilled into war in mid-April and has since claimed thousands of lives and displaced millions of Sudanese.
The east African regional group IGAD had invited the warring parties to negotiations in Addis Ababa on Monday, while fighting still continued in Sudan.
Neither Burhan nor Daglo personally attended the meeting in Addis Ababa, although a representative of the RSF attended the “quartet” meeting led by South Sudan, Djibouti, Kenya, and Ethiopia, AFP reported.
War’s impact on Sudan
Since 15 April, about 3,000 people have been killed in the war, according to the data released by Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, but the actual tally is believed to be much higher as areas of the war-hit country remain inaccessible.
According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), a further 3 million people have been displaced internally or fled to neighbouring countries.
Multiple diplomatic initiatives to end the war have resulted in only brief respites, with the United Nations (UN) warning on Sunday that the country was on the brink of a full-scale civil war that could destabilise the whole region.
Previous truce agreements have been brokered by the US and Saudi Arabia, but the east African bloc now tries to take the lead.
However, the foreign ministry of Sudan said on Monday that its delegation would not attend the meeting until its request to remove Kenya as head of the negotiations was met.
The ministry had demanded to remove the Kenyan President William Ruto as the head of the negotiations, especially due to his biasness, the statement said.
In a communique rafter after Monday’s meeting, the quartet declared the absence of the Sudanese Armed Forces’ delegation in spite of the invitation and confirmation, regrettable.
Daglo had sent a political adviser to the meeting in Addis Ababa, while the RSF in a statement criticized “irresponsible behavior” on the part of the army.
The quartet decided to mobilize and focus all stakeholders’ efforts toward ensuring a face-to-face meeting between the leaders of the warring parties.
It also urged the rival generals to immediately end the violence and ink an unconditional and indefinite cease-fire agreement.
