Sudan

Russia and China are blocking the appointment of a French diplomat at the head of a new political mission of the United Nation to support the democratic transition in the East African country.

Former Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir went on trial in Khartoum Wednesday for staging the coup that brought him to power in 1989.

Sudan’s prime minister has replaced his finance, energy and health ministers and four other cabinet-level officials in response to growing public demands for sweeping reforms.

The transitional government, Freedom and Change Forces (FFC) and armed groups agreed on Wednesday evening to allocate 75 seats of the Transitional Legislative Council to Sudanese Revolutionary Forces and SLM of Minni Minnawi. The deal struck on the transitional parliament comes after over ten days of difficult talks in Khartoum as the armed groups initially requested 140 seats.

Tens of thousands of Sudanese protesters have taken to the streets calling for reforms and demanding justice for those killed in anti-government demonstrations that ousted President Omar al-Bashir last year.

Khartoum’s meetings for peace in Sudan are stalled over the number of parliamentary seats to be allocated to the armed groups during the transitional period.

At a donor conference for Sudan, Berlin promised to make investments in in areas such as water, food security and education. Germany urged the Sudanese government to invest in human rights.

A High-Level Sudan Partnership Conference took place on Thursday gathering some 50 countries and international organizations together in Berlin, generating pledges to bolster the African nation’s economic and political transformation to the tune of $1.8 billion, and discuss the challenges that lie ahead.

Mounting economic turbulence is rocking Sudan’s delicate political transition. Without urgent donor assistance to provide economic relief to a suffering population, public support for the cabinet’s reform agenda could collapse. Any failure in the civilian-military government could have tragic consequences for Sudan and the region.

After more than a decade on the run, alleged Sudanese war criminal Ali Kushayb sat in a courtroom in the Netherlands this week, accused of commanding Janjaweed fighters who raped, tortured and killed civilians in Darfur.