United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that US President Donald Trump has been personally overseeing efforts to bring an end to the war in Sudan, now deep into its third year of acute suffering for the civilian population.
Speaking during a cabinet meeting at the White House on Wednesday, Rubio said that Trump is “the only leader in the world capable of resolving the Sudan crisis”.
Last month, Trump announced plans for the US to work with other members of the Quad – the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, along with other regional partners – to end the brutal 30-month conflict.
Speaking at a conference in the US, Trump said he had been asked by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to intervene to bring an end to the war in Sudan.
Trump described Sudan as “one of the most violent places” in the world, facing the planet’s largest humanitarian crisis. He added that international leaders had called on him to intervene and leverage his influence to stop the violence.
The civil war in Sudan erupted in April 2023, as the government-controlled Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) clashed with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for control of areas including the capital Khartoum.
Peace negotiations have been complicated by recent RSF advances.
Earlier this week, the RSF claimed to have seized control of Babnusa, a key city in the vast central Sudanese region of West Kordofan. The SAF has disputed this claim.
Babnusa serves as a gateway to the western Darfur region, over which the RSF took full control last month, and the whole of western Sudan.
The RSF’s assault on Babnusa builds on the paramilitary group’s momentum after it captured the city of el-Fasher, the army’s final holdout in Darfur, following an 18-month siege. The RSF has been accused of committing widespread atrocities in el-Fasher.
The latest fighting also appears to break the unilateral ceasefire that was announced by the RSF following mediation efforts by the Quad.
The SAF, which rejected the ceasefire terms presented by the Quad as too favourable to its adversary, has accused the RSF of continuing attacks despite its declared truce. It also said that the UAE’s involvement in the Quad is biased and that the proposal aimed to eliminate the army.
The UAE has been widely accused of supporting the RSF with money and weapons, but it has staunchly rejected any involvement.
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said on Thursday that he feared new atrocities amid the intense fighting between the SAF and RSF.
The UN Human Rights Council has already mandated one inquiry into alleged atrocities – including systematic mass murder, rape, torture, and forced displacement of non-Arab ethnic groups – after the RSF seized el-Fasher.
Sudan’s war has killed more than 40,000 people, according to UN figures, but aid groups said that is an undercount and the true number could be many times higher.
The UN said the war has created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis as millions of people have been forced to flee their homes and parts of the country have been pushed into famine.
Al Jazeera Arabic correspondent Asmaa Mohammed, reporting from the al-Afad refugee camp in Sudan’s Northern State, said families displaced from Darfur and Kordofan — the sites of intense fighting in recent weeks — were in a “dire humanitarian condition.”
She added that there were also shortages of emergency services, medicine, and specialised medical personnel, including paediatricians.
