Coup attempt in Sudan 'thwarted' by army

Sudan’s government said Islamist supporters of former president Omar Al Bashir were behind a failed coup in the capital Khartoum on Tuesday, the latest challenge to a fragile transitional government aiming to lead the country towards elections.

Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said the attempted putsch was organised by elements inside and outside the military establishment, leading to the first arrests of those involved.

While details about the coup attempt and its leadership were scarce, Sudan's minister of religious affairs, Nasr Eldeen Mofarih, suggested Islamists linked to the former regime of the longtime dictator Bashir, who was overthrown in 2019, were responsible.

"The attempts of the corrupt remnants of the vanished regime will be to no avail," he said in a statement. “The time has come to sweep our political and military institutions from the remnants of Islamists.”

Since the uprising to topple Bashir in April 2019, an uneasy power-sharing arrangement between Sudanese civilian and military figures and former warlord Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, widely known as Hemedti, has aimed to lead the country towards democratic elections, currently scheduled for 2024.

But civilian leaders privately question whether the military men will ultimately surrender power, while authorities also warn of the threat posed by remnants of the old regime.

In an address to his troops on Tuesday, the powerful paramilitary commander Mr Daglo said: "We will not allow a coup to take place. We want real democratic transition through free and fair elections."

Tuesday’s reported mutiny was the latest challenge to the transitional government since Bashir’s ouster, with authorities reporting failed coups in July 2019 and in January 2020. In March last year, Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok reportedly survived an assassination attempt after his convoy was attacked in Khartoum.

While the transitional government has rejoined the international community after successfully lobbying for Khartoum’s removal from Washington’s state sponsors of terrorism blacklist in December, Sudan’s economy is yet to rebound after three decades of isolation.

Amid severe inflation and shortages of basic goods, the transitional government has introduced reforms sufficient to secure funding from the International Monetary Fund and an agreement from the Paris Club of creditors to cancel $14 billion of Sudan's debt and to restructure the rest of the more than $23 billion owed.

Bashir meanwhile remains in prison in Khartoum facing domestic charges.

The 77-year-old is also wanted by the International Criminal Court over alleged responsibility for war crimes committed in Darfur in the early 2000s.

The ICC's chief prosecutor Karim Khan held talks with Sudanese officials last month seeking to expedite his extradition to face justice in the Hague.