UN chief urges Sudan’s warring parties to halt hostilities during Muslim holy month of Ramzan

The head of the UN said that the conflict in Sudan, which has been going on for almost a year, poses a threat to national unity and “may ignite regional instability of dramatic proportions” and asked the warring parties to cease hostilities during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on Thursday.

Sudan’s UN ambassador claimed that Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, the leader of the country’s military, who has been engaged in combat with the opposing commander of the paramilitary force, welcomed the Ramzan truce request. However, Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces leader, remained silent for the time being.

The appeal was made by UN Secretary-General António Guterres in advance of Friday’s anticipated vote by the UN Security Council on a resolution written by the British that called for “an immediate cessation of hostilities ahead of the month of Ramzan.”

The draft resolution expresses “grave concern over the spreading violence and the catastrophic and deteriorating humanitarian situation, including crisis levels of acute food insecurity, particularly in Darfur.”

Sudan plunged into chaos last April, when long-simmering tensions between the military and paramilitary leaders broke out into street battles in the capital, Khartoum.

Fighting spread to other parts of the country, but in Sudan’s western Darfur region it took on a different form, with brutal attacks by the Arab-dominated Rapid Support Forces on ethnic African civilians. Thousands of people have been killed.