The Americans and Saudis hope to expand the talks to achieve a permanent end to the fighting, and civilian rule, “as the Sudanese people have demanded for years,” a senior State Department official, Victoria Nuland, told a congressional hearing on Wednesday.
After the first shots rang out in Khartoum, fighting rapidly spread across the country, with particularly intense violence in the western Darfur region and, last week, in the town of El-Obeid in south-central Sudan.
Both sides have repeatedly agreed to, and broken, cease-fires negotiated by foreign officials. These included a 72-hour truce brokered by the United States in late April and a weeklong cease-fire announced by South Sudan this month.
In cities like Khartoum, the fighting has taken place in heavily populated areas, with both sides deploying machine guns, bazookas, rockets and, in the case of the army, warplanes. Officers with the paramilitary forces have taken defensive positions in neighborhoods and hospitals, according to residents, with the army retaliating by shelling them.
The United Nations’ top human rights body held an emergency session in Geneva on Thursday to draw attention to killings, injuries and other abuses of civilians. The head of that body, Volker Turk, accused both sides of violating humanitarian law.
As the fighting has intensified, hospitals, laboratories and medical workers, who are already operating in dire conditions and with no supplies, have increasingly come under attack.
Abdi Latif Dahir contributed reporting from Nairobi.
