Sudan: Waiting and praying for news of victory after two years of war

Published

2 months ago

February 18, 2025

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From the crowded northwestern market spilling over with returnees, vendors and soldiers, to the barren stalls of central Omdurman still devastated by brutal battles, people here are praying for news of a military victory after almost two years of war.

Omdurman, along with Khartoum and Khartoum North (Bahri), are jointly called the tri-capital and constitute the national capital of the republic of Sudan.

The Sudanese army has now reclaimed Khartoum North and is moving quickly to liberate Khartoum – the heart of the capital – from all directions.

Its grass-roots support here is born out of sheer necessity – a need to release Sudan’s cities from a deadly occupation by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – the militia that was once trained and armed by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) is fighting it for absolute control.

RSF siege conditions, SAF airstrikes and shelling have killed tens of thousands of civilians in the capital alone, and now the final battles for its liberation are proving to be the most brutal.

“We have seen heads cut off bodies,” emergency response room (ERR) volunteer Momen Wad Zeinab tells us in the backyard of one of the few functioning hospitals, Al Nao hospital in Omdurman.

“We see a lot of things. We aren’t good, all of us. One of our fellow volunteers has gone mute for over a month now. We have tried to give him relaxants to help him but now we have had to keep him away from the hospital.”

Momen adds: “Nowadays, we are with the military because we see the RSF as the big enemy. First, we will finish with the RSF by attack or negotiation. Then, after the war, we will try to rebuild.”

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The ERRs have been hailed for their life-saving work and nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. But their revolutionary roots as the neighbourhood resistance committees that planned pro-democracy demonstrations and treated injured protesters in Sudan’s 2019 revolution have left them vulnerable to arrests by the Sudanese authorities.

Under his breath, Momen tells us the intelligence officer escorting our team through the hospital has arrested him before. When I called to speak to him a day later, he’d just been released from detention after showing up to provide assistance at another health facility in Omdurman failing to keep patients alive.

“Our revolution has become another kind of revolution. It is not always about marches and fighting and saying no – sometimes it is by helping people here,” he says.

“After the war finishes, we will go back to the street and fight against the military and say to them we need civilians to rule this country.”

One of his fellow volunteers was killed in the recent RSF shelling of Al Nao hospital. Four other members of this ERR have died from sickness or combat injuries. And after risking their lives since the start of the war in April 2023, their capacity has now been compromised by Donald Trump’s freezing of USAID funding.

Past the dwindling ERR pharmacy giving out free medicine and the bustling blood bank, there is an outdoor waiting room where we find 13-year-old Mohamed.

He was caught in the latest RSF shelling of one of the largest surviving markets in SAF territory, Sabreen. Shrapnel broke Mohamed’s leg as he sold biscuits at a stall to help his family.

The strike was one of the deadliest single attacks in the capital since the start of the war, killing close to 60 people and injuring 200.

“I saw dead people and bodies torn apart. It was not a pretty sight,” Mohamed tells me with wide eyes.

“When I remember it, I feel shock.”

The bricks and cement that made up a two-storey building in Sabreen market are still crumbling at the site of the attack.

“People are just trying to eat. They have nothing to do with the military, nothing to do with this war,” the area commander tells us, pointing at the rubble.

“The RSF knows where the military sites are but they want to terrorise civilians.”

Two weeks later, the streets of Sabreen market are heaving with people who have to make a living despite the risk, civilians and soldiers merging into a river of people.

As we approach the car to leave the market, a security officer yells in our direction: “No civilian rule, no nothing! Only dictatorship from now on!”

There is a tense silence of embarrassment and glares from the soldiers around him. For the first time, it is hard to tell who is a career officer and who could be a protester turned recruit.

“Revolutionaries have become military recruits, community volunteers have become military recruits, and Islamists have become military recruits,” a revolutionary turned soldier, Tewa, tells me after another day on the frontline.

“Whatever our background is and differences are, there is now a collective goal to defend the country.”

World

Canada might be the second election Trump wins in six months

Published

48 mins ago

April 28, 2025

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Canada might be the second election Trump wins in six months

When Canada goes to the polls today, it might be the second election Donald Trump wins in six months.

The US president has transformed Canada’s political landscape, and the “Trump effect” looks like it will be the difference between winners and losers.

Tariffs, and his threat to annexe the country as the 51st state, have provoked a surge in Canadian nationalism, and it’s made a favourite of the candidate styled anti-Trump.

Step forward, Mark Carney: Former governor of the Bank of England, now Canadian prime minister.

His ruling Liberal party had been written off as an electoral contender. Canadians had turned their back on the party after a decade in power under Carney’s predecessor, Justin Trudeau.

The opposition Conservative Party, under the effective leadership of Pierre Poilievre, grew to a 25-point lead in the polls on the promise of change on the economy, crime and a chronic housing crisis.

However, his conservative politics are more aligned with the neighbour in the White House and, in Canada right now, it’s not a good look.

In a stunning reversal of fortune, the Conservative Party’s lead vanished within weeks, as Canadians turned to Carney as the choice to take on Trump.

If he wins, the swing from Conservative to Liberal will be the biggest swing in the polls in recent democratic history.

Carney, 60, is the former governor of the Bank of Canada, as well as England. He replaced Mr Trudeau as Liberal Party leader and Canadian prime minister after his predecessor stepped down last month.

Polls indicate that Canadians see Carney as a stronger choice to negotiate with Donald Trump. He is a veteran of economic turmoil, having dealt with the 2008 financial crisis and Brexit.

At a weekend news conference, Sky News asked the Canadian prime minister what lessons he’d learned from Brexit that could be applied to his dealings with Donald Trump.

He replied: “The lessons of Brexit are beginning to be applied. When you break off, or substantially rupture, trading relationships with your major trading partners, including the most important trading partner of the United States, you end up with slower growth, higher inflation, higher interest rates, volatility, weaker currency, a weaker economy.

“We’re in the early stages of that in the United States, and that’s one of the important things here. With respect to influencing the president, with respect to the dynamics of a negotiation, America’s going to get weaker as time goes on, we’re going to get stronger.”

Canada’s vote is as close as it gets to a single-issue election.

Carney’s position as favourite is reinforced consistently by the opinion polls, although the gap narrowed as election day approached.

It could yet be tight.

World

Trump ‘very disappointed’ in Russian strikes on Ukraine and calls for Putin to ‘sit down and sign a deal’

Published

7 hours ago

April 28, 2025

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Trump 'very disappointed' in Russian strikes on Ukraine and calls for Putin to 'sit down and sign a deal'

Donald Trump has said he’s “very disappointed” with Russia as he continues to push for a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine.

On Saturday, the US president met with Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the Vatican for their first face-to-face meeting since their explosive White House summit.

The Ukrainian president said the meeting ahead of Pope Francis’s funeral could end up being “historic.” Hours later, Mr Trump questioned Vladimir Putin’s appetite for peace in a Truth Social post.

Speaking before boarding Air Force One on Sunday, Mr Trump again said the meeting went well, and that the Ukrainian leader was “calmer”.

“I think he understands the picture, I think he wants to make a deal,” he said, before turning to Mr Putin and Russia.

“I want him to stop shooting, sit down and sign a deal,” the US president said, adding he was “very disappointed that they did the bombing of those places (including Kyiv, where nine people were killed in a Russian airstrike on Friday) after discussions”.

However, Mr Trump said he thinks Mr Zelenskyy is ready to give up Crimea, which the Ukrainian leader has repeatedly said he would refuse to do.

He added that “we’ll see what happens in the next few days” and said “don’t talk to me about Crimea, talk to Obama and Biden about Crimea”.

Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, while Barack Obama was president.

Meanwhile, US secretary of state Marco Rubio told Sky’s US partner network NBC News that a peace deal to end the war was “closer in general than they’ve been any time in the last three years, but it’s still not there”.

“If this was an easy war to end, it would have been ended by someone else a long time ago,” he added on the Meet the Press show.

It comes after North Korea confirmed it had deployed troops to fight for Russia, months after Ukraine and Western officials said its forces were in Europe.

State media outlet KCNA reported North Korean soldiers made an “important contribution” to expelling Ukrainian forces from Russian territory, likely to be the Kursk region.

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KCNA said leader Kim Jong Un made the decision to deploy troops to Russia and notified Moscow, and quoted him as saying: “They who fought for justice are all heroes and representatives of the honour of the motherland.”

It also quoted the country’s ruling Workers’ Party as saying the end of the battle to liberate Kursk showed the “highest strategic level of the firm militant friendship” between North Korea and Russia.

Last June, Mr Kim and Mr Putin signed a comprehensive strategic partnership treaty after a state visit – his first to the country in 24 years.

The North Korean leader promised at the time “full support and solidarity to the Russian government, army and people in carrying out the special military operation in Ukraine”.

World

40 killed in blast at Iran’s biggest port as Tehran denies explosion ‘linked to fuel for missiles’

Published

7 hours ago

April 28, 2025

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40 killed in blast at Iran's biggest port as Tehran denies explosion 'linked to fuel for missiles'

At least 40 people have been killed and several hundred more injured after an explosion and fire at Iran’s largest port, according to state media.

The blast, at the Shahid Rajaei container hub near the southern city of Bandar Abbas, happened on Saturday as Iran held a third round of talks with the US in Oman about Tehran’s nuclear programme.

Shipping containers burned, goods inside were badly damaged and the explosion was so powerful that windows several miles away were shattered, reports said.

Helicopters and aircraft dumped water from the air on the blaze and by Sunday afternoon it was 90% extinguished, the head of Iran’s Red Crescent Society told state media.

Officials said port activities had resumed in unaffected parts of Shahid Rajaei.

Out of the 752 people who had received treatment for their injuries, 190 were still being treated in medical centres on Sunday, according to Iran’s crisis management organisation.

Chemicals at the port were suspected to have worsened the blast, but the exact cause of the explosion was not clear.

Iran’s defence ministry denied international media reports that the explosion may be connected to the mishandling of solid fuel used for missiles.

The reports were “aligned with enemy psyops [psychological operations]”, according to a ministry spokesperson, who told state TV the blast-hit area did not contain any military cargo.

According to the Associated Press, British security company Ambrey said that the port in March received sodium perchlorate, which is used to propel ballistic missiles and the mishandling of which could have led to the explosion.

The Financial Times previously reported two Iranian vessels had shipped from China enough of the ingredient to propel up to 260 mid-range missiles.

It was reportedly to help Tehran replenish stocks after its missile attacks on Israel in 2024.

Iran’s military has sought to deny the delivery of sodium perchlorate from China.

Iran’s state-run Irna news agency reported on Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin deployed several emergency aircraft to Bandar Abbas to provide help.