Sudan military leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF leader Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (Photo: Arab News)
Sudan’s warring parties have made no progress towards a ceasefire in their latest talks, instead reiterating past agreements to improve access to humanitarian aid, host Saudi Arabia said on Tuesday.
“The facilitators regret that the parties were unable to agree on a ceasefire during this first round, as there is no acceptable military solution to this conflict,” the official Saudi Press Agency reported.
Fighting erupted in April between the forces of army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
More than 10,000 people have been killed in the war so far, according to a conservative estimate by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data project.
Saudi Arabia hosted talks in the Red Sea coastal city of Jeddah during the war’s first weeks which resulted in the Jeddah Declaration, a commitment to spare civilians and civilian infrastructure and to let in badly needed aid.
But within a week United Nations aid chief Martin Griffiths told AFP there had been “important and egregious” violations of the agreement.
Multiple early truces were violated as well.
The United States, which has helped facilitate the Jeddah talks, tried to downplay expectations for this latest round, with officials stressing it was too early to discuss a lasting political solution.
However they did raise the possibility the talks would work on “achieving ceasefires”, and Saudi Arabia voiced hope for “a political agreement under which security, stability and prosperity will be achieved for Sudan and its brotherly people”.
The results have so far come up well short of that, and it was unclear on Tuesday what the next steps would be.
