Sudan protests dispersed
Security forces stormed a protest camp in the Sudanese capital Khartoum yesterday morning and at least 13 people were reported killed in the worst violence since the overthrow of President Omar al-Bashir in April.
Footage shared on social media and verified by Reuters showed chaotic scenes of people fleeing through streets as sustained bursts of gunfire crackled in the air. People rushed to carry away those who had been hit.Witnesses said a sit-in next to the Defence Ministry, the focal point of anti-government protests that started in December, had been cleared, but protesters poured onto the streets elsewhere in Khartoum and beyond in response to the crackdown.
The main protest group accused the ruling military council of breaking up the camp, calling the action “a massacre”. The military council denied trying to break up the camp and said security forces had targeted “unruly” groups nearby.
An alliance of protest and opposition groups said it was halting all contact with the military council. The two sides had been negotiating for weeks over who should govern in a transitional period after Bashir’s overthrow, though the talks had stalled.The Transitional Military Council (TMC) had offered to let protesters form a government but insisted on maintaining overall authority during an interim period.
Demonstrators want civilians to run the transitional period and lead Sudan’s 40 million people to democracy.A group of doctors linked to the opposition said 13 “martyrs” had been killed in yesterday’s violence, and that at least 116 people had been wounded.
It said security forces had surrounded one Khartoum hospital and had opened fire at another where they were pursuing protesters.”The protesters holding a sit-in in front of the army general command are facing a massacre in a treacherous attempt to disperse the protest,” said the Sudanese Professionals Association, the group that has spearheaded protests.It urged the Sudanese people to come to their aid.
The British Ambassador in Khartoum said he had heard heavy gunfire for more than an hour from his residence and he was extremely concerned.”No excuse for any such attack. This. Must. Stop. Now,” Ambassador Irfan Siddiq wrote on Twitter.
The US Embassy in Khartoum also described the attack on the protest camp as “wrong” and said it must stop.”Responsibility falls on the TMC,” the embassy said on its Twitter account.
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