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Al-Ahram Weekly
28-06-2025
- Politics
- Al-Ahram Weekly
Accusations of chemical weapons in Sudan: What we know - War in Sudan
The US State Department imposed sanctions on the Sudanese government Friday, accusing it of using chemical weapons last year in its war against rival paramilitaries. Since April 2023, the war between the army and the Rapid Support Forces has drawn widespread accusations of war crimes, with the US determining in January that the RSF had committed genocide. Sanctions The State Department in May notified Congress of its determination that "the Government of Sudan used chemical weapons in 2024", in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention, which Khartoum ratified in 1999. Washington did not provide details on where or when the chemical attacks occurred. Sudan's army-aligned government immediately denied the US allegations, calling them "baseless" and "political blackmail". Washington's sanctions, initially intended to go into effect on June 6, restrict US exports and financing. Urgent humanitarian aid will be exempted from the sanctions on Sudan, where nearly 25 million people are suffering dire food insecurity in the world's largest hunger crisis. History of accusations In January, the New York Times reported the Sudanese army had used chemical weapons at least twice in the war, citing four anonymous senior US officials. They said the chemical agent used, with the direct approval of army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, was chlorine. The army, which has been in control of Sudan for most of its post-independence history since 1956, has been accused of carrying out chemical attacks before. In 2016, an Amnesty International investigation accused the army -- then allied with the RSF -- of using chemical weapons on civilians in the western region of Darfur. Khartoum denied the accusations. In 1998, the US claimed the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum was producing chemical components for Al-Qaeda, before destroying the factory in a missile attack. Past sanctions Relations between the US and Sudan were strained for decades under the rule of Omar al-Bashir, who came to power in 1993 and whose Islamist-military rule was long accused of supporting terrorism. US sanctions imposed in the early 1990s were tightened in 2006 following accusations of genocide in the Darfur region, carried out on behalf of Khartoum by the RSF's predecessor militia, the Janjaweed. After a popular uprising ousted Bashir in 2019, the US removed Sudan from its list of state sponsors of terrorism and began to lift sanctions. Some were reintroduced following a 2021 coup, led by Burhan alongside his then-deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, before the allies' power struggle erupted into all-out war in April 2023. By January 2025, the US had imposed sanctions on both Burhan and Daglo, who is commonly known as Hemeti. Efforts at mediation, including by the Biden administration, have repeatedly failed to produce a ceasefire. Expected impact Sudanese civilians have long borne the brunt of sanctions on their country. Both Burhan and Hemeti's camps built considerable wealth while under a decades-long sanctions regime, finessing transnational financial networks while the country was left underdeveloped. Today, Africa's third-largest country is suffering what the UN calls the world's worst humanitarian crisis, with over 10 million people internally displaced and famine already declared in parts of the country. The US was Sudan's largest donor in 2024, contributing 44.4 per cent of the UN's $2 billion-humanitarian response plan. Following US President Donald Trump's suspension of most foreign aid, the US has dropped its contribution by nearly 80 per cent. US exports were valued at $56.6 million in 2024, according to data from the US Census Bureau. Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
Jordan Times
30-04-2025
- Politics
- Jordan Times
Sudan army chief names Bashir-era diplomat as acting premier
PORT SUDAN, Sudan — Sudan's army chief Abdel Fattah Al Burhan appointed on Wednesday a career diplomat as the country's new acting prime minister, two years into the country's brutal war. Ambassador Dafallah Al Haj Ali, a veteran envoy who once served as Sudan's representative to the United Nations under longtime Islamist-military ruler Omar Al Bashir, was most recently the country's ambassador to Saudi Arabia. The kingdom was the destination of Burhan's first foreign trip after the army regained control of the capital Khartoum from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) last month. Since April 2023, the war in Sudan has pitted the forces of Burhan's army against those loyal to his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo. The conflict has killed tens of thousands, displaced 13 million and created what the United Nations describes as the world's worst humanitarian crisis. Ali replaces Osman Hussein, a largely symbolic prime minister installed by Burhan after a 2021 military coup that toppled civilian premier Abdalla Hamdok's transitional government. Burhan also named Omar Sediq, another veteran diplomat who was involved in negotiations between the army and the RSF in Jeddah last year, as acting foreign minister. Burhan had earlier said that he would form a technocratic wartime government to help "complete what remains of our military objectives, which is liberating Sudan from these rebels". Early this month, the RSF announced it would form its own rival government, a few weeks after signing a charter in Kenya with a coalition of military and political allies. The move has raised international fears that Sudan could be permanently split between the two sides, both of which have been accused of atrocities. The conflict has already divided Africa's third largest country in two, with the army controlling the centre, north and east, while the RSF holds nearly all of the western Darfur region and parts of the south.
