Seven months of (new) war between rival generals in Sudan has left thousands dead, displaced millions and raised the risk of disintegration of the country, which was already in a fragile state before the latest hostilities began.

Attack on Darfur

The war began on April 15 between the head of the army, the general Abdel Fatah al Burhan, and the head of the i paramilitaries of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and his old ally, General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.

So far they have been killed more than 10,000 peopleaccording to estimates by the non-governmental organization Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (Acled), with the actual number of casualties believed to be higher.

Also more than six million people have been displacedwhile most of the country’s infrastructure has been destroyed.

At the beginning of November they were registered new massacres following a widespread DTY offensive in Darfur, where the paramilitaries announced the capture of army bases in almost all major cities in the province.

In Ardamata alone, hundreds of people have reportedly been killed by armed groups, which have forced more than 8,000 people to flee to neighboring Chad in the space of a week, according to the UN.

The EU said it was “shocked” by “more than 1,000 dead” over two days in Ardamata, warning of the possibility of “ethnic cleansing”.

Since the start of the war, the UN has recorded more than 1.5 million internally displaced people in Darfur, a province the size of France that is home to a quarter of Sudan’s 48 million people.

No winner

Although General Daghlo can rely on the support of his powerful allies, first and foremost the United Arab Emirates, General Burhan maintains the role of Sudan’s de facto leader on the international stage, participating in UN and Arab League summits.

On the field, however, the rapid advance of the DTY in Darfur “gives them an advantage”.

Arab militias, the Janjaweed, make up the bulk of the DTY’s membership. In the 2000s, under the Daghlo administration, they implemented a scorched-earth strategy in Darfur, looting, raping and killing members of non-Arab ethnic groups on behalf of dictator Omar al-Bashir.

Despite the advance of paramilitaries in Darfur, the chances of either side achieving a decisive victory remain slim, said a military analyst who spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to him, “even if the army manages to regain control of Khartoum, which is expected to be very difficult, sending troops in order for (the army) to retake the areas of Darfur controlled by DTY is a huge logistical challenge “, as more than 1,400 kilometers separate Khartoum from El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, on the border with Chad.

The country faces the risk of dissolution

As WDF paramilitaries continue their brutal onslaught in Darfur province, experts worry about a repeat of the “Libyan scenario,” a reference to the deep political crisis rocking the North African country, which borders Sudan. where two rival governments vie for power.

In Sudan, the SDF now controls most of the capital Khartoum and has made advances in Darfur. At the same time, the government and the heads of the regular army have left the capital and moved to Port Sudan, which has been spared the violence, heightening fears of the country’s disintegration.

“Continuation of the conflicts may lead to scary scenarios, such as division,” warns Omar Youssef, a spokesman for the Forces of Freedom and Change (FLC), the political bloc ousted from power after the 2021 coup by the two generals who were then allied, but are now at war.

“The rising tide of (civilian) militarization is exacerbating social rifts,” he adds.

At the negotiating table the two sides, neither of which has managed to gain a decisive advantage, are not expected to back down, as the failure earlier this month of US-Saudi-sponsored talks once again demonstrated. leaving clear the possibility of the country’s disintegration in the event of a prolongation of the hostilities.

The inability to reach a political solution could lead to a situation similar to that prevailing in Libya after 2011, with “more than one government, with no real effectiveness or international recognition”, estimates Fagez al-Shaliq, a political analyst and journalist.