KHARTOUM —
Sudan on Monday named a new military commander for the troubled Blue Nile
state, where recent bitter ethnic clashes over land have left at least 200
people dead and sparked angry demonstrations.
اضافة اعلان
The new chief comes a day after eyewitnesses
reported that crowds of thousands protested in front of army headquarters in
the state capital Damazin, accusing the government of failing to protect them,
with the local university suspending work.
Army spokesman Nabil Abdallah, announcing
Monday a new commander for the southern
Blue Nile state, said the military had
ordered a committee to “evaluate the security situation”.
Blue Nile, which borders South Sudan and
Ethiopia, is awash with guns and is still struggling to rebuild after decades
of civil war, with over 300 people killed in recent months.
Sudan has been grappling with deepening
political unrest and a spiralling economic crisis since last year’s military
coup led by army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan.
A surge in ethnic violence in recent months
has highlighted the security breakdown since the coup.
On Sunday, thousands of protesters demanded
the resignation of state governor Ahmed Al-Omda Badi, with eyewitnesses
reporting the crowd “tried to enter the army headquarters” before “setting fire
to the state government building.”
Badi declared a state of emergency on Friday
to quell some of the worst fighting in recent months.
On Monday, Blue Nile University in Damazin
announced “the suspension of classes and exams” due to “the unfortunate
events”.
At least two hundred people were killed in
two days of fighting last week, official media said Saturday, after clashes
broke out over reported land disputes between members of the Hausa people and
rival groups.
The violence follows clashes earlier this
year between the same groups in Blue Nile, leaving at least 149 people killed
and 65,000 displaced from July to early October, according to the UN.
The Hausa have mobilized across Sudan,
claiming they were discriminated from owning land in Blue Nile because they
were the last group to arrive there.
Access to land is highly sensitive in the
impoverished country, where agriculture and livestock account for 43 percent of
employment and 30 percent of GDP, according to UN and World Bank statistics.
Nearly 600 people have been killed and at
least 211,000 forced to flee their homes in inter-communal conflicts across the
country since January, according to the UN.
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