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The Army of Sudan takes over the presidential palace of Khartoum, hitting a quick support forces in a key symbolic victory.
The Army of Sudan and his supporters celebrate across the country after the troops took over the presidential palace in the capital, Khartoum.
Friday’s victory may be the most symbolic of the army since the launch of a key counter-offensive against the paramilitary support forces (RSF) in September of last year.
The RSF continues to control the pockets in the south of Khartoum, but lost most of the capital since Sudan broke out in a civil war in April 2023.
Development occurs only a few days after the RSF chief Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo published a video urging his fighters not to abandon the palace.
Civilians generally welcomed the army as liberators despite certain militia reports aligned by the army producing human rights violations after the RSF withdrawals.
The RSF has committed countless atrocities in Sudan, including in Khartoum.
A recent report from the Office of the High Commissioner of the United Nations Human Rights (OHCHR), revealed that the RSF fighters had owned at least 10,000 people in Khartoum from the start of the war until June last year.
“In areas that the RSF controls, they kill people, violated women and destroy all humanity. Whenever the army arrives, people become happy because they feel more safe. Even children are happy, ”said Yousef, a young Sudanese.
A different scenario outside Khartoum
The capture by the army of the presidential palace raises fears that Sudan is approaching more and more of a de facto score, say the analysts.
The RSF already supports a parallel government and remains controlling of four of the five regions of the sprawling region of Darfur, which is approximately the size of France.
The RSF recently captured the Desert City Al-Mali Strategic in the north of Darfur, which is the last region where the army and its armed groups aligned still have a certain control.
Despite the gain, the RSF is struggling to capture El-Fasher, the capital in the north of Darfur where the army still has a garrison.
Sharath Srinivasan, expert in Sudan and professor at the University of Cambridge, told Al Jazeera that Sudan seems to be heading for a “Libya scenario”, referring to the split of governance between two competing authorities which are aligned on a network of armed groups and militias.
“He believes that geographic bifurcation becomes stronger, except El-Fasher of course. RSF must secure El-Fasher to claim a de facto state, which is not certain at all,” he said.
Peace time?
The army has long refused to engage in peace talks with the RSF And said on several occasions that he planned to take over the country.
The RSF also used diplomacy as a cover to intensify military operations in Sudan, analysts said in Al Jazeera. In January of last year, Hemedti signed a “principle of principles” with an ostensible anti-war coalition known as Taqaddum.
Hemedti then visited several heads of state across Africa While his forces continued to plunder, kill and terrorize civilians in the state of the Gezira of Sudan, an important bath of bread.
The two parties recently promised to continue to fight, which raises fears that the clashes are intensifying in the west of the country, in particular in the regions of Kordofan and Darfur.
Fighting can also degenerate to Khartoum due to the range of sophisticated weapons flowing in the country. A few moments after the army celebrated the retirement of the presidential palace, a drone struck and killed three journalists in the region, he said.
The fighting in progress could turn large regions of Sudan more deeply in disorders. The conflict has already sparked the largest humanitarian crisis in the world by most of the measures.
Tens of thousands of people have died, thousands of people have disappeared and millions suffer from catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
