KHARTOUM, June 4, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Sudan’s army ruler General Abdel Fattah
al-Burhan said Tuesday the country’s military rulers had decided to cancel
what they had previously agreed with protesters about the country’s
transition and hold elections within nine months.
It came the after Sudan’s military forcefully broke up a weeks-long sit-in
outside Khartoum’s army headquarters calling on the country’s ruling generals
to hand over to civilian rule, leaving more than 30 dead.
“The military council decides to stop negotiating with the Alliance for
Freedom and Change and cancel what had been agreed on and to hold general
elections within nine months,” Burhan said in a statement broadcast on state
television early on Tuesday.
Burhan added the election would take place under “regional and
international supervision”.
The Transitional Military Council ousted president Omar al-Bashir in April
after months of protests against his authoritarian rule.
It had agreed a three-year transition period for transferring power to a
civilian administration and that parliament be composed of 300 members for
the transition, with around two-thirds from the protest alliance and the rest
drawn from other political groups before talks broke down on May 20.
Thousands of people remained camped outside the military headquarters
calling for the generals to cede power before security forces used force to
break up the sit-in, leaving some 30 people dead and hundreds wounded,
according to doctors close to the protesters.
It drew sharp international criticism, with both the US and the UN
condemning the breaking up of the sit-in.
The Alliance for Freedom and Change had announced “the end of all political
contact and negotiations with the putschist Council” following the deaths.
Burhan said that the military council would order an investigation into it.
“The military council promises an investigation into today’s events and
invites the general prosecutor to take that over,” he said in the address.