KHARTOUM — A breakthrough deal was signed Sunday to
reverse the military takeover in Sudan, nearly a month after the country's top
general ousted the prime minister, as a teenager was killed in an ongoing
crackdown on protests.
اضافة اعلان
Thousands of demonstrators rejected the deal and held fresh
protests, shouting "No to military power" and demanding the armed
forces fully withdraw from government.
A 16-year-old boy was shot in the head and fatally wounded
in Khartoum's twin city Omdurman, according to medics, who reported
"numerous" other people with gunshot wounds after clashes with
security forces.
Gen. Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan appeared at the presidential
palace in Khartoum for a televised ceremony with a haggard looking premier
Abdalla Hamdok, emerging from weeks of house arrest.
The 14-point deal they signed officially restores the
transition to civilian rule that had been derailed by the October 25 putsch in
the poverty-stricken African country.
The agreement, which comes after crisis talks involving
Sudanese, UN, African, and Western players, stated that Burhan's decision
"to relieve the transitional prime minister (of his duties) is
cancelled".
It said all political detainees would be freed and formally
relaunched the fragile transition process towards full democracy that started
after the 2019 ouster of long-time autocrat Omar al-Bashir.
Hamdok praised the people power "revolution" that
brought him to government and declared the top priority now was to "stop
the bloodshed in Sudan before anything else".
"We leave the choice of who rules Sudan to its mighty
people," he said.
Burhan thanked Hamdok for his service and vowed that
"free and transparent elections" would be held as part of the
transition process.
"He was patient with us until we reached this
moment," Burhan said before posing for photos with the reinstated premier
and his own deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, head of the paramilitary Rapid
Support Forces.
Sudan's neighbors Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which have strong
ties with the Sudanese military, praised the agreement hours after it was
signed.
The African Union welcomed it as "an important step
towards the return to constitutional order", encouraging all sides to
"implement it inclusively and effectively".
'Safeguard freedoms'
The UN welcomed the deal but also stressed the "need to
protect the constitutional order to safeguard the basic freedoms of political
action, freedom of speech and peaceful assembly".
However, outside the presidential palace and in cities
across Sudan, thousands again rallied, confronted in the capital by security
forces who fired tear gas — the latest of a series of protests that, medics
say, have cost 41 lives.
Police deny firing live ammunition and insist they have used
"minimum force" to disperse the protests. They have recorded only one
death among demonstrators, in north Khartoum.
The main civilian bloc which spearheaded the anti-Bashir
protests and signed the 2019 power-sharing deal with the military strongly
rejected Sunday's agreement.
"We affirm our clear and previously declared position
that there is no negotiation, no partnership, no legitimacy for the coup,"
said the mainstream faction of the Forces for Freedom and Change.
The Sudanese Professionals' Association, an umbrella of
unions instrumental in bringing down Bashir, described Sunday's agreement as
"political suicide" for Hamdok.
At one north Khartoum rally, protesters also chanted
anti-Hamdok slogans and ripped up his portrait.
"Hamdok is weak but the streets are powerful,"
they shouted in Khartoum.
"Hamdok has truly let down the people," said
protester Mohamed Abdelnabi. "This deal doesn't represent the Sudanese
people."
Thousands also rallied in Omdurman, as well as in the
eastern state of Kassala, the restive eastern coastal city of Port Sudan and
the northern city of Atbara, according to witnesses.
History of coups
Sudan, which is mired in a dire economic crisis, has a long
history of military coups, having enjoyed only rare interludes of democratic rule
since independence in 1956.
The return of Hamdok, a British-educated economist who has
worked for the UN and African organizations, has been a key demand of the
international community.
Burhan, who served under Bashir's three-decades long rule,
become Sudan's de facto leader after the army ousted and jailed the president
following months of huge street protests.
The veteran general has headed a Sovereign Council of
military and civilian figures, with Hamdok as prime minister leading the
cabinet.
But long-simmering tensions between the military and
civilian sides marred the transition, until Burhan last month staged the army
takeover.
Burhan has insisted the military's move "was not a
coup" but a step "to rectify the transition".
Earlier this month, he announced a new ruling council in
which he kept his position as head, along with Daglo, three senior military
figures, three ex-rebel leaders and a civilian.
The other four civilian members were replaced with lesser
known figures.
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