The leader of the powerful paramilitary group fighting Sudan's army has delivered scathing criticism of its rival force and the government on the eve of US-sponsored peace talks, claiming they represent only themselves and their interests.
In a video posted online, Gen Mohamed Dagalo of the Rapid Support Forces accused the army of igniting the civil war and called for an international inquiry to establish who fired the first shot on April 15, 2023, and to hold the guilty party to account.
“I would like to re-emphasise that there is no legitimate government in Sudan after the October 25 coup [in 2021] and the outbreak of the war on April 15 [last year],” he said, alluding to the overthrow of a transitional government he and his then-ally, army chief Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan, jointly led.
The RSF has agreed to participate in peace talks scheduled to start in Geneva, Switzerland on Wednesday. The army has strongly indicated it will not attend, saying differences remain unresolved after two days of consultations with US officials in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
However, US special envoy to Sudan Tom Perriello said the talks would go ahead as planned, even if army representatives fail to show. “We have not given up hope that the SAF [Sudan Armed Forces] will attend the talks,” he told a briefing on Monday at the US mission in Geneva.
“We will move forward with this event this week and that has been made clear to the parties."
There cannot be “formal mediation between the two parties if the SAF does not attend – in which case we continue to focus on the international and technical elements," he added.
The war between the army and the RSF broke out in April 2023 when weeks of tension over their respective roles in a hoped-for democratic Sudan boiled over into violence.
The fighting was initially restricted to the capital Khartoum but soon spread to western and southern Sudan. The RSF, whose forerunner was the notorious Darfur-based Janjaweed militia, has made significant territorial gains and is in near total control of the capital.
The war has to date internally displaced at least 10 million people, according to the UN, with 2.3 million having fled across Sudan's borders, mostly to Chad, Egypt and South Sudan. Millions more are facing hunger and famine was declared last week at a camp housing 500,000 people in Darfur.
The country's grave humanitarian situation has been compounded by widespread flooding that has displaced more than 20,000 people since June across 11 of Sudan’s 18 states, according to the International Organisation for Migration.
“We in the Rapid Support Forces and since the war broke out give priority to the option of peace over continuing the war,” Gen Dagalo said in the video, claiming the influence of Islamist extremists allied with Gen Al Burhan was behind the army's reluctance to participate in this week's talks.
“We appeal to the other party to answer the call for peace so as to alleviate the suffering of our people. We bravely make this appeal when we are victorious on the battlefield,” Gen Dagalo added.
Analysts say Gen Al Burhan will have to negotiate an end to the war, given the near impossibility of a military end to the conflict, particularly in view of the army's loss of territory to the RSF.
It is not the first time Gen Al Burhan has rejected invitations from the US and Saudi Arabia to participate in peace talks.
He insisted the army would not negotiate until the RSF implements a humanitarian deal reached earlier this year in Jeddah, sponsored by the US and Saudi Arabia, obliging the paramilitary to vacate the private homes and state installations its fighters have occupied.
Gen Al Burhan also wants the army-backed government – not the army itself – to take part in any negotiations, a condition analysts believe is designed to gain international legitimacy for the administration that sits in Port Sudan on the Red Sea, east of Khartoum.
“Al Burhan is trying to take advantage of the situation to gain international recognition for a government that's not accepted by anyone in the world,” said Sudanese analyst Bahaa Abu Issa.
“The Islamists loyal to former president Omar Al Bashir are also exercising tremendous pressure on him not to negotiate in the belief that only through war they can regain power.”
The army has sought the help of those loyal to Al Bashir's regime in the war against the RSF, allowing their militias to fight alongside troops to compensate for a shortage of enlisted men.
Al Bashir's regime was overthrown by the army in 2019 amid a popular uprising.
Both the army and the RSF are accused of war crimes, with the paramilitary facing charges of ethnic cleansing in Darfur, where its fighters and allied militiamen have killed thousands of ethnic Africans and forced tens of thousands to flee their homes and seek refuge in Chad.
The paramilitary is also accused of sexual assaults, arbitrary detentions and torture, while the army is charged with killing thousands in air strikes targeting RSF positions in populated areas.
In his video, Gen Dagalo said he intended to create a special force in areas under the paramilitary's control, to protect civilians and take decisive action against those suspected of abusing residents. The force would also protect relief workers and co-ordinate with aid groups, he said.
The RSF has repeatedly vowed to bring to justice members accused of abusing civilians, saying field tribunals will try them. It dismissed the killings in Darfur as a tribal conflict.
The top prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has said he expects to soon issue arrest warrant applications for key people responsible for the violence in Sudan.
The ICC last year opened a new investigation into war crimes in the region and “investigators, analysts, lawyers, the men and women of our office, with civil society … have made some significant progress”, Karim Khan told the UN Security Council.
He said he hoped to "announce applications for warrants of arrest regarding those or some of those individuals that are the most responsible for what we're seeing at the moment”.
Al Shafie Ahmed contributed to this report from Kampala, Uganda
