Sudan’s West Darfur Declares State of Emergency Amid Tension

By Staff, Agencies

Authorities in Sudan's restive province of West Darfur on Monday declared a state of emergency across the area in response to rising tension.

State-run SUNA news agency reported that a two-week night-time curfew has also been declared.

It did not, however, say what had prompted the local government to announce the state of emergency.

Local media reports attributed the decision to tribal violence that left an unspecified number of residents dead and houses burnt down in a rural area.

Tribal and ethnic violence has been on the rise in the entire Darfur region since a military coup in October 2021 derailed Sudan's democratic transition and created a security vacuum in the country's outlying areas to the west and south.

Hundreds have been killed and tens of thousands displaced as a result.

Darfur was the site of a ruinous civil war in the 2000s that pitted rebels seeking a bigger share of the nation's resources against the Khartoum government.

The conflict left at least 300,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced, according to the UN.

A peace deal reached in October 2020 between the military and several rebel groups in Darfur has failed to address the root causes of violence in the region, allowing deadly clashes to continue since over pastures, water and land.

The violence typically involves ethnic African farmers and cattle-herding tribesmen of Arab descent.

Sudan, a vast Afro-Arab nation, has been bogged down in a series of civil wars since its independence in 1956.

The conflicts, mostly in the west and south, have drained the country's resources and left its multi-ethnic and multi-religious fabric scarred.