US envoy says talks to end 15-month war will begin in Geneva on Wednesday, even if Sudan’s army does not show up.
Negotiations to end the 15-month war in Sudan between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) will advance in Geneva this week, US special envoy Tom Perriello said, as the United Nations United Nations warns of a “cataclysmic tipping point” in Sudan.
The US last month invited Sudan’s warring sides to hold ceasefire talks in Switzerland, more than a year after fighting began between the army and the RSF.
Although the RSF has agreed to US-mediated talks, Sudanese army leader General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan has said the military will not participate in the talks.
“We will not retreat, we will not surrender and we will not negotiate,” al-Burhan told troops at the time.
Al Jazeera’s Hiba Morgan, reporting from Khartoum on Monday, said talks will begin on Wednesday regardless of whether the Sudanese army is present.
“[The US special envoy] made it very clear that this would be the launch of the process… and not the beginning of the ceasefire negotiations themselves. He said there are several other countries and bodies that are involved in the process of trying to bring the Sudanese army and the RSF together in talks in Geneva to stop the fighting,” Morgan said.
“The Sudanese army has made it clear that there are certain conditions that need to be met and the Sudanese government has also made this clear. They say they want a guarantee that the Jeddah agreement that was signed between the Sudanese army and the RSF in Jeddah last year will be implemented by the RSF.
“They say they want their representation in Geneva to be like a government and not like the Sudanese army and this seems to be a way for the government to ask for legitimacy.”
On Monday, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Mirjana Spoljaric Egger, said she hoped talks scheduled for this week would result in solid humanitarian measures and remove obstacles blocking a ceasefire.
She described the situation in Sudan as a “humanitarian disaster”.
“We are not part of these talks, but I hope they find agreements that allow us to increase humanitarian assistance, that allow us to have more access to the affected populations, especially in North Darfur, the situation is extremely worrying. ,” she said at a press conference at the ICRC headquarters in Geneva.
Speaking at an event marking the 75th anniversary of the Geneva Conventions, she called for “very concrete humanitarian measures that will help build trust and remove some of the immediate obstacles to a ceasefire agreement”.
‘Breaking Point’
Meanwhile, the UN migration agency has warned that Sudan is at a catastrophic “tipping point”, with tens of thousands of preventable deaths imminent due to multiple crises.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said the famine and floods added to a catalog of challenges faced by millions of people in the war-torn country, in the midst of the world’s biggest displacement crisis.
“Make no mistake: these conditions will persist and worsen if conflict and restrictions on humanitarian access continue,” said Othman Belbeisi, IOM director for the Middle East and North Africa, in a statement on Monday.
“Without an immediate, massive and coordinated global response, we risk witnessing tens of thousands of preventable deaths in the coming months. We are at breaking point – a catastrophic, cataclysmic breaking point.”
The war has been raging since April 2023 between the Sudanese army commanded by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the RSF, led by his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo.
The conflict left tens of thousands dead, according to the UN.
The IOM said new figures show that more than 10.7 million people are internally displaced in Sudan, many of them uprooted multiple times. Meanwhile, 2.3 million fled across borders to neighboring countries.
This story originally appeared on Aljazeera.com read the full story
