Sudan jails 3 activists; protests persist

CAIRO — Sudanese security forces detained three prominent pro-democracy figures overnight, their relatives and other activists said Wednesday, as internal and international pressure mounted on the country’s military after its coup.

The arrests came as protests denouncing Monday’s takeover continued in Khartoum, the capital, and elsewhere, and many businesses shut in response to calls for strikes. The coup threatens to halt Sudan’s fitful transition to democracy, which began after the 2019 ouster of longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir in a popular uprising.

Groups of protesters — in some places, dozens, in others, hundreds — set up barricades of stones on main roads throughout the day. Security forces waded in, chasing demonstrators and dismantling the barriers.

“It looks like a hit-and-run process: They remove, and we build,” activist Nazim Sirag said.

Some protesters were shot and wounded, activists said, though they did not have exact figures. Security forces confronting demonstrators have killed at least six people since Monday and wounded more than 140 others, some critically, according to physicians with the Sudan Doctors’ Committee.

Prominent rights defender Tahani Abbas said the pro-democracy movement would continue street protests despite the crackdown.

“We are frustrated,” she said, “but we have no other option but the street.”

The coup came after weeks of mounting tensions between military and civilian leaders over the course and pace of Sudan’s moves toward democracy.

The African Union suspended Sudan — an expected move typically taken in the aftermath of coups. The African Union Peace and Security Council said via Twitter on Wednesday that the suspension would remain in place “until the effective restoration of the civilian-led Transitional Authority,” as the deposed government is known.

The African Union plans to send a mission to Sudan to hold talks with rival parties.

The World Bank also suspended disbursements for its operations in Sudan, whose economy has been battered by years of mismanagement and sanctions and was dealt a blow when the oil-rich south seceded in 2011 after decades of war, taking with it more than half of public revenue and 95% of oil exports.

Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok’s now-deposed government had embarked on a series of overhauls meant to transform the country’s economy and have the nation rejoin the international community after more than two decades of isolation under alBashir.

In May, the World Bank said it had allocated $2 billion to Sudan to finance big infrastructure projects along with other improvements over the next 12 months, after the U.S. provided bridge financing of $1.15 billion to Cleese Sudan’s overdue payments to the global financing body.

After widespread international condemnation, the military allowed Hamdok and his wife to return home Tuesday night. Hamdok, a former U.N. economist, was detained along with other government officials when the military seized power.

Several Western embassies in Khartoum said Wednesday they will continue to recognize Hamdok and his Cabinet as “the constitutional leaders of the transitional government” of Sudan.

In a joint statement, the embassies of the European Union, the U.S., the U.K., France and several other European countries called for the release of other detained officials and for talks between the military and the pro-democracy movement.

The general leading the coup, Abdel-Fattah Burhan, has pledged to hold elections, as planned, in July 2023, and to appoint a technocrat government in the meantime.

But critics doubt the military is serious about eventually ceding control, noting that the coup was carried out just weeks before Burhan was supposed to hand over the leadership of the top ruling body, the Sovereign Council, to a civilian. The council, which was made up of civilian and military leaders but led by a general, was the ultimate authority in the country, while Hamdok’s transitional government ran day-to-day affairs. Both were dissolved in the coup.

Volker Perthes, the U.N. special envoy for Sudan, met Wednesday with Burhan and reiterated the U.N.’s call for a return to the transition process under the constitutional document and the immediate release of all those arbitrarily detained.

Perthes also met Hamdok in his residence “where he remains under guard,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

The activists taken overnight were Ismail al-Taj, a leader of the Sudanese Professionals’ Association, the group at the forefront of the protests that brought down al-Bashir; Sediq al-Sadiq al-Mahdi, a leader in Sudan’s largest political party, known as Umma and brother of Foreign Minister Mariam al-Mahdi; and Khalid al-Silaik, a former media adviser to the prime minister.

Meanwhile, flights in and out of Khartoum’s international airport resumed Wednesday, a day after the country’s Civil Aviation Authority said they would be suspended until Saturday.