Smoke rises above buildings in Khartoum on April 15, 2023, amid reported clashes in the city.
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KHARTOUM, Sudan (AP) — Sustained firing broke out in the Sudanese capital Saturday morning amid simmering tensions between the military and the country’s powerful paramilitary forces.
The sounds of heavy shooting could be heard in a number of areas, including central Khartoum and the neighbourhood of Bahri.
The clashes come as tensions between the military and the Rapid Support Forces, as the paramilitary is known, have escalated in recent months, forcing a delay in the signing of an internationally backed deal with political parties to revive the country’s democratic transition.
In a statement issued Saturday morning, the RSF accused the army of attacking its forces at one of its bases in South Khartoum. The military used light and heavy weapons in the attack, it said. The army has not commented on the incident.
Commercial aircraft trying to land in the capital, Khartoum, began turning around to head back to their originating airport. Flights from Saudi Arabia turned back after nearly landing at Khartoum International Airport, flight tracking data showed Saturday.
Tensions between the army and the paramilitary stem from a disagreement over how the RSF, headed by Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, should be integrated into the military and what authority should oversee the process. The merger is a key condition of Sudan’s unsigned transition agreement.
However, the army-RSF rivalry dates back to the rule of autocratic President Omar al-Bashir, who was ousted in 2019. Under the former president, the paramilitary force grew out of former militias known as the Janjaweed that carried out a brutal crackdown in Sudan’s Darfur region during the decades of conflict there.
In a rare televised speech Thursday, a top army general warned of potential clashes with paramilitary force, accusing it of deploying forces in Khartoum and other areas of Sudan without the army’s consent. The RSF defended the presence of its forces in an earlier statement.
The RSF recently deployed troops near the northern Sudanese town of Merowe. Also, videos circulating on social media Thursday show what appear to be RSF-armed vehicles being transported into Khartoum, farther to the south.
In Saturday’s statement, the RSF said they were contacted by three former rebel leaders, who hold government positions, in an apparent bid to de-escalate the conflict.
Sudan has been married in turmoil since Oct. 2021 Western-backed, power-sharing administration and dashed Sudanese aspirations for democratic rule after three decades of autocracy and repression under al-Bashir.
