Sudanese security forces on Friday fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators who marched after noon prayers in Khartoum as protests against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir’s 30-year-old rule widened.
Protests against the government first flared last month and have posed the most serious challenge yet to al-Bashir, a former army general who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes in the Darfur region.
At least 22 people have been killed and hundreds wounded in the protests, which were sparked by anger over rising food prices and cash shortages, but quickly turned against al-Bashir’s government. The crackdown drew a rare rebuke from the state-funded Sudanese National Commission for Human Rights.
Photo: AFP
Friday’s protests appeared to have drawn more people than before and were more widespread. In previous weeks the protests began only after sundown.
Reuters witnesses said that security forces used tear gas against dozens of demonstrators in al-Halfaya Bahri, in the south of Khartoum, and against a separate demonstration by dozens of people emerging from Sayed Abdel Rahman Mosque in Omdurman, which sits on the other side of the Nile River from the capital.
Security forces chased the demonstrators into side streets, but there were no immediate reports of casualties, the witnesses said.
In Omdurman, army forces on minitrucks with automatic guns were seen guarding a gas station.
In a separate incident, witnesses said that hundreds of demonstrators emerged from a mosque known to be affiliated with al-Bashir’s government in the Jabra district of southern Khartoum chanting: “The people want the fall of the regime.”
Footage posted on social media appeared to show a stream of demonstrators passing by the mosque while chanting derogatory slogans against al-Bashir’s Islamist ideology-based administration. The authenticity of the recording could not immediately be verified.
North of Khartoum, demonstrators blocked the main road linking the capital to the Red Sea city of Port Sudan, witnesses said, without giving any further details.
Three demonstrators were killed during protests on Thursday and Amnesty International accused security forces of chasing injured victims into Omdurman Hospital.
Authorities said that they had set up a commission to investigate the incident.
In a strongly worded statement, the human rights commission slammed the attack on Omdurman Hospital and called for a swift investigation into the deaths of citizens.
“We look with great regret at the use of live ammunition against unarmed civilians,” it said. “We also express deep concern over the use of tear gas within the confines of the Omdurman hospital, which has led to harming the patients, those accompanying them and of health practitioners.”
Sudan’s economy was crippled when the south seceded in 2011, taking away much of its oil resources. The crisis has deepened since last year, when the country saw some brief protests over bread shortages.
The US in October 2017 lifted 20-year-old trade sanctions on Sudan, but many investors continue to shun a country still listed by Washington as a state sponsor of terrorism.
Al-Bashir came to power in a 1989 coup and has won successive elections that his critics said were neither fair nor free.
The rivalry between Asia’s two biggest countries has extended into outer space. After India’s landing of its Chandrayaan-3 rover on the moon last month — becoming the first country to put a spacecraft near the lunar south pole and breaking China’s record for the southernmost lunar landing — a top Chinese scientist has said claims about the accomplishment are overstated. Ouyang Ziyuan (歐陽自遠), lauded as the father of China’s lunar exploration program, told the Chinese-language Science Times newspaper that the Chandrayaan-3 landing site, at 69 degrees south latitude, was nowhere close to the pole, defined as between 88.5 and 90 degrees. On Earth,
A cat wearing a black and yellow security vest strolls nonchalantly past security guards lined outside a Philippine office building waiting to receive instructions for their shift. Conan, a six-month-old stray, joined the security team of the Worldwide Corporate Center in the capital, Manila, several months ago. He is one of the lucky moggies unofficially adopted by security guards across the city, where thousands of cats live on the street. While the cats lack the security skills of dogs — and have a tendency to sleep on the job — their cuteness and company have endeared them to bored security guards working 12-hour
He is better known for rallying global support for Ukraine, but US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday picked up another favorite tool of diplomacy — his guitar. The lifelong music fan turned top US diplomat showed off his guitar chops, as he launched a new initiative of music diplomacy through which the US is to send top artists to countries including China and Saudi Arabia. After performances in the US Department of State’s formal reception room by the likes of jazz icon Herbie Hancock, Dave Grohl of Nirvana and Foo Fighters fame, and rising young pop singer Gayle, Blinken took
TEMPORARY HITCH? Biden said the US ‘cannot ... allow American support for Ukraine to be interrupted,’ and he expects House Speaker McCarthy to come up with a solution The threat of a federal government shutdown suddenly lifted late on Saturday as US President Joe Biden signed a temporary funding bill to keep agencies open with little time to spare after the US Congress rushed to approve the bipartisan deal. The package dropped aid to Ukraine, a White House priority opposed by a growing number of Republican lawmakers, but increased federal disaster assistance by US$16 billion, meeting Biden’s full request. The bill would fund the US government until Nov. 17. After chaotic days of turmoil in the US House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy abruptly abandoned demands for steep spending cuts