Sudan

Volker Perthes, the head of a new UN mission in Sudan, sat down for an interview with The New Humanitarian in March.

The head of the UN Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS) Volker Perthes voiced "great concern" about the slow pace of peace implementation in the country.

In June 2021, the UN Security Council is expected to renew the mandate of the United Nations Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan(UNITAMS) for the first time. In this context, the International Peace Institute (IPI), the Stimson Center, and Security Council Report organized a virtual workshop on April 26, 2021, to discuss UNITAMS’s mandate and political strategy.

President Emmanuel Macron pledged that his government will cancel Sudan’s $5 billion debt to France in support of the democratic transition in the East African country.

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Sudan is in the international spotlight on 17 May at a high-level conference in Paris hosted by President Macron in support of its fledgling democratic transition. This important moment is intended to signal Sudan’s reintegration into the international community, following its removal from the US list of State Sponsors of Terrorism (SST) in 2020. It is also an opportunity for Sudan to rebrand itself and tell the world that it is open for business.

Armed groups from Sudan’s western region of Darfur – and other parts of the country – signed a peace deal in October with the transitional government, which took power following the revolution that ousted long-serving ruler Omar al-Bashir in 2019. But after trekking to a rebel base in the far-flung Jebel Marra mountains in early March, The New Humanitarian found the conflict is far from over: … .

Violence in the West Darfur capital of El Geneina has stopped after days of deadly ethnic and tribal clashes, but people who fled their homes urgently need food, water, shelter, and sanitation, according to the U.N. refugee agency. … More than 1,800 people fled into neighboring Chad since the recent clashes erupted on April 3, “bringing the total number to 5,000 including those who fled since January,” said the U.N. statement.

[…] Speaking after the meeting, the Minister of Defence Lt-Gen Yassin Ibrahim said that the Security and Defence Council decided to "form a joint force made up of regular forces and all parties signatory of the peace agreement, a flexible force capable of rapid intervention to maintain security in Darfur."