Al-Burhan ready to dialogue with Hemedit to end Sudan war
The chairman of the Sudan Sovereign Council, Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, expressed his readiness to dialogue with the leader of Rapid Support Forces, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo.
“I am ready for dialogue with the commander of the rebel forces Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo,” Al-Burhan told BBC in an interview on Saturday.
“If the leadership of these rebel forces wants to come to their senses and withdraw their forces from residential areas and return to their barracks, we will sit with any of them, especially if they adhere to what was agreed upon in Jeddah. We will sit down to solve this problem.”
During his address to the 78th United Nations General Assembly, al-Burhan said the war in Sudan has been classified by some as an internal war between two armed parties.
“I assure you that the danger of the war has become a threat to regional and international peace and security, as the rebels have sought help from outlaw groups and terrorist groups from several countries in the region,” he said.
The two leaders have been fighting a brutal internal war since April, and the United Nations says it has left more than 5,000 people dead, in addition to displacing more than five million people.
The Sudanese army commander, Al-Burhan has been on a foreign diplomatic tour seeking international support and some kind of legitimacy for his leadership.
When asked about attack on civilians, Al-Burhan denied that his forces were targeting civilians, despite reports by the United Nations and other charitable organizations of evidence of his forces launching random air strikes on residential areas.
He said government of Sudan has been providing convoys, and difficulties facing humanitarian work have been overcome.
The Sudanese general said he was “confident of victory” but admitted that he had to move his command headquarters to Port Sudan because the fighting in the capital, Khartoum, made it impossible for the government to continue.
Al-Burhan stressed that he would sit with General Hemedti as long as he was committed to protecting civilians, which is what the two sides pledged during the Jeddah talks in Saudi Arabia last May.
