Embattled Sudanese have little hope of concrete action from Arab League summit

Khartoum resident wants UN and African Union to apply pressure on the two sides to accept a ceasefire

An all-but-deserted road in Khartoum during fighting between the forces of two rival generals. AFP

The war in Sudan and its human cost is expected to dominate deliberations at the Arab League summit when it opens in Saudi Arabia on Friday, with leaders taking the floor one after the other to call for the violence to stop and relief supplies to reach civilians.

But hundreds of kilometres away in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital ripped apart by the war, hardly anyone is looking to the summit for action that would give the city’s embattled residents a respite from the death and devastation upending their lives.

Hours before the summit opened, Sudan's capital and its sister city Bahri came under renewed air strikes as widespread looting by armed men and civilians deepened the woes of residents, already pinned down by the fighting.

Army chief Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan on Friday sacked one-time ally-turned-war enemy Gen Mohamed Dagalo, commander of the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), from his post as his deputy on the military-led Sovereign Council.

Gen Al Burhan's decision is largely academic five weeks into the war between the two generals, but it nevertheless underlines the seemingly unbridgeable gap that separates them.

Friday's air strikes targeted districts in eastern Khartoum and witnesses reported hearing anti-aircraft weapons used by the RSF. Bahri and Sharg el-Nil across the Nile from Khartoum were subjected to bombardment overnight and on Friday morning.

“The Arab League [summit] in Jeddah will only yield statements calling for a ceasefire in Sudan, but no concrete action,” said Khaled Hashem, 44, a resident of Khartoum’s Tayef district.

“We want to see a mechanism bringing together the United Nations and the African Union to pressure the two side into accepting a ceasefire.”

Disillusionment with the effectiveness of the Arab League has been growing for years, with many in the Arab world seeing the Cairo-based organisation as strong on rhetoric and short on action.

The perceived weakness of the Arab League, founded more than 75 years ago, has given rise to more effective and dynamic alliances within the Arab world, such as the Gulf Co-operation Council and the now-dormant Arab Maghreb Union. More recently, like-minded Arab leaders have formed four or five-nation axes with the focus on trade and economic integration.

The Arab League, moreover, has a poor track record on past civil wars in Sudan in which millions were killed or displaced in the nearly 70 years since independence.

For example, it was the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, a regional African grouping, that mediated an end to Sudan's 22-year civil war in the south of the country in 2005. The previous war between the north and south of Sudan began in 1955 and ended in 1972 with an agreement mediated by regional and international church groups and signed in Ethiopia. In 2019, Ethiopia played a key role in setting up a power-sharing deal between the military and civilian groups after the ousting of dictator Omar Al Bashir.

“Judging by past experiences, you cannot rely on the Arab League. All I can expect from the summit in Jeddah is a declaration of solidarity with the people of Sudan or support for the US-Saudi mediation,” said Mohammed Abdel Aziz, 40, a resident of Omdurman, one of Khartoum’s two adjoining cities.

“It may be too late even for that. The Sudan crisis has become too complex and may not be resolved any time soon,” he said.

The violence in Sudan flared on April 15 and quickly spread to the Darfur region in western Sudan and later to Kordofan State, also in the west. But the war stayed focused in Khartoum, where heavy weaponry has been used.

The fighting has also caused shortages of power, water and food. Most of the city’s hospitals are not running and those that are open are operating on significantly reduced capacity. Pockets of hunger have also emerged.

According to the latest estimates, more than 840,000 people have been displaced in Sudan and more than 220,000 have fled to neighbouring countries.

The UN said on Wednesday that more than half of Sudan's 46 million population needed humanitarian assistance and protection, launching a $3 billion aid appeal. It also said it had received reports of "horrific gender-based violence" in Sudan.

Several ceasefires declared since the fighting broke out were all ignored.

“The Arab League often takes a middle course so as not to upset any party. In this case, it will likely try not to be seen as supporting the army or the RSF,” said Karamallah Mohammed, a Khartoum resident.

Significantly, Gen Al Burhan and Gen Dagalo each have regional supporters, something that feeds into Mr Mohammed’s argument regarding the Arab League’s tendency not to take sides in the internal disputes of its member nations.

“You can expect that the summit’s Sudan resolution will reiterate the general principles contained in international and regional declarations since April 15,” said Mohamed Anis Salem, a former career diplomat with decades of experience in the Middle East.

“There is no appetite for more advanced steps, like assigning a special envoy, creating an observer group or a peacekeeping mission,” said Mr Salem, who sits on the Egyptian Council for Foreign Relations, a think tank in Cairo.

“The focus will be on co-ordination with other efforts as well as Utopian calls for calm and negotiations.”