First posted at Save Darfur…Six hours later, the State Department finally released a statement condemning the violence against protesters yesterday in Sudan.
A full 36 hours after the beginning of the crackdown in Khartoum, we still have not heard the Obama administration address the troubling situation in Sudan. This morning the BBC reports that Sudan People’s Liberation Movement’s (SPLM) Secretary General Pagan Amum (one of those arrested yesterday) has stated that peace in Sudan is in serious crisis.
Headlines this morning in the Sudanese papers demonstrate the urgency. The “Juba group” of political parties has demanded the resignation of the Ministers of Justice and the Interior, as well as the police chief of Khartoum, for their actions yesterday (in Arabic). Meanwhile, Omar al-Bashir’s National Congress Party (NCP) alleges that the opposition yesterday attempted to undermine the elections, overthrow the government, and take control of the government (in Arabic). NCP members particularly called out Hassan al-Turabi, the intellectual who helped Bashir come to power in 1989, for being behind the plot.
The Sudan Tribune also carries a number of stories on yesterday’s events. Reading about the subsequent protests in the South, which turned ugly quickly, one realizes that it’s not hyperbole when Sudanese and others speak of being on the edge of the abyss. Things could get much worse if the right flame is lit.
