As the crisis in Sudan intensifies despite truces and ceasefires, many regional interests are at stake — and under threat. So who is backing who in Africa’s third-biggest nation? DW takes a look.
The conflict in Sudan has seen two generals, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, fight for control over Africa’s third-largest country and its vast resources.
On April 24, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed “deep concern” about the activities of Wagner Group mercenaries in Sudan and asserted that the Russian private military company (PMC) “simply brings more death and destruction wherever it is involved.” Blinken’s dire warning followed revelations from Sudanese and American officials about Wagner Group’s assistance to Rapid Support Forces (RSF) chief Mohammed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo. These allegations included claims that Wagner supplied the RSF with surface-to-air missiles from its Khadim and Jufra installations in Libya or offered such weaponry from its stockpiles in the Central African Republic (CAR).
Sudan is geostrategically important to U.S. interests in both Africa and the Middle East. The country’s military rulers, Lt.-Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his deputy Lt.-Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (also known as “Hemedti”), are banking on that fact as they seek to press the Biden administration to focus its Sudan policy on stability, rather than supporting calls for democracy.
Earlier this month, Bayt al Maqdis, a jihadi publishing house believed linked to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), released a book compiled of various letters written by the ideologue Abu Hudhayfah al Sudani.
Where is Danish foreign policy headed? Everything now revolves around the war in Ukraine and rearmament against Russia, which is quite openly called our enemy, and where sanctions are being extended and trade and contacts are being cut off in all areas. NATO now also talks about China in its new strategy papers. But what about Africa, which has for decades received Danish development aid? What does the government say about Africa, which belongs to the Global South, today a widely used term?
Only Civilian Leaders Can Forge a Path to Peace
Less than five years into its halting journey toward democracy, Sudan is spiraling toward protracted civil war. On April 15, fighting erupted between the country’s two main security organs, the army and a paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which have been jockeying for power ever since they jointly overthrew longtime dictator Omar al-Bashir in 2019. The hostilities have been most intense in the capital city, Khartoum, but violence has broken out in at least eight of Sudan’s 13 states. Hundreds of civilians have been killed, and regional powers are lining up behind the main belligerents, promising to replenish their war stocks and enabling them to continue tearing the country apart.
January 30, 2022. Update added April 23, 2023
Like all the nations of the Horn of Africa that abut the Red Sea, the main passageway for the transit of Middle Eastern oil, Sudan has been a prize desired by many imperialist nations. (For a background summary of the region, see this.) For 75 years, there has been a large leftist opposition within the country. Now another military coup has taken place and led to mass protests. We international anti-racists and anti-capitalists should take note, support, and assess what chance there is that these large, valiant rebellions with their great human costs will actually bring about the kind of worker run society we need and strive for everywhere.
India and China, the world’s two most populous nations with over 1.4 billion people each, are expected to be outranked by sub-Saharan Africa in the 2030s.
A new analysis by the Washington-based Population Reference Bureau (PRB) released last week indicates that while India’s population will soon eclipse China’s, its growth is slowing.
Over the past two years, the steady expansion of terrorist and fundamentalist threats in the Sahel has not gotten the attention it deserves given the region’s repeated military coups and political turmoil. Due to the apparent contagion effect of military coups, the political instability in the Sahel has resulted in a regional and international focus on electoral timetables and constitutional rule while overlooking the rise of terrorist groups, which continue to gain ground and menace the very existence of Sahel countries.
Pour couper les revenus annuels d’al Shabaab, estimés à 100 millions de dollars et générés par les extorsions, il faudra rétablir l’intégrité des agences financières, judiciaires et de renseignement compromises de la Somalie.