South Kordofan Residents Flee as New Front in Sudan War Develops

FILE - Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP Photo, File)
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South Kordofan Residents Flee as New Front in Sudan War Develops

FILE - Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, Thursday, June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP Photo, File)

Residents of the city of Kadugli in southwest Sudan began fleeing the city on Thursday as tensions escalated between the army and a powerful rebel group, threatening to open another area of conflict in the country's ongoing war, witnesses said.

Mobilization around Kadugli, capital of South Kordofan state, and an escalation of fighting in Darfur come after nearly 10 weeks of fighting focused in the capital, Khartoum, between Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Reuters said.

The United States and Saudi Arabia adjourned talks they had been facilitating in Jeddah, US Assistant Secretary of State Molly Phee said at a congressional hearing in Washington.

"The format is not succeeding in the way that we want," she said, after a series of violated ceasefire agreements.

Since mid-April the war has uprooted more than 2.5 million people from their homes and threatened to destabilize neighboring countries suffering from a combination of conflict, poverty and economic pressures.

In the fighting between the army and the RSF, army air strikes on Thursday morning hit areas of southern Khartoum and Omdurman, and the RSF responded with anti-aircraft weaponry, residents said.

ESCALATION IN THE WEST

The army on Wednesday accused the SPLM-N rebel group led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, which controls parts of South Kordofan state, of breaking a long-standing ceasefire agreement and attacking an army unit in the city.

The army said it had fought back the incursion but sustained losses.

South Kordofan has Sudan's main oil fields and borders West Darfur State as well as South Sudan.

The SPLM-N, which has strong ties to South Sudan, also attacked the army in the South Kordofan city of al-Dalanj on Wednesday, as did the RSF, residents said.

Residents of Kadugli said the army had redeployed forces to protect its positions in the city on Thursday, while the SPLM-N was gathering in areas on the outskirts.

There were electricity and communications outages as well as dwindling food and medical supplies, they said.

The war has also brought an eruption of violence in Darfur, with the West Darfur city of El Geneina the worst hit.

In Al Fashir, capital of North Darfur, the army and the RSF clashed violently, including around the main market, witnesses said after having deployed across the city on Thursday, witnesses said.

Nyala, capital of South Darfur and one of Sudan's largest cities, has also seen clashes between the army and RSF in recent days, amid electricity and communications blackouts. Both cities had been relatively calm after locally negotiated truces.



Egypt Says GERD Lacks Legally Binding Agreement

This grab taken from video shows Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, Ethiopia, Feb. 20, 2022. (AP Photo)
This grab taken from video shows Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, Ethiopia, Feb. 20, 2022. (AP Photo)
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Egypt Says GERD Lacks Legally Binding Agreement

This grab taken from video shows Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, Ethiopia, Feb. 20, 2022. (AP Photo)
This grab taken from video shows Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, Ethiopia, Feb. 20, 2022. (AP Photo)

Egypt said Friday that Ethiopia has consistently lacked the political will to reach a binding agreement on its now-complete dam, an issue that involves Nile River water rights and the interests of Egypt and Sudan.

Ethiopia’s prime minister said Thursday that the country’s power-generating dam, known as the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), on the Nile is now complete and that the government is “preparing for its official inauguration” in September.

Egypt has long opposed the construction of the dam, because it would reduce the country's share of Nile River waters, which it almost entirely relies on for agriculture and to serve its more than 100 million people.

The more than the $4 billion dam on the Blue Nile near the Sudan border began producing power in 2022. It’s expected to eventually produce more than 6,000 megawatts of electricity — double Ethiopia’s current output.

Ethiopia and Egypt have spent years trying to reach an agreement over the dam, which Ethiopia began building in 2011.

Both countries reached no deal despite negotiations over 13 years, and it remains unclear how much water Ethiopia will release downstream in case of a drought.

Egyptian officials, in a statement, called the completion of the dam “unlawful” and said that it violates international law, reflecting “an Ethiopian approach driven by an ideology that seeks to impose water hegemony” instead of equal partnership.

“Egypt firmly rejects Ethiopia’s continued policy of imposing a fait accompli through unilateral actions concerning the Nile River, which is an international shared watercourse,” Egypt’s Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation said in a statement Friday.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, in his address to lawmakers Thursday, said that his country “remains committed to ensuring that our growth does not come at the expense of our Egyptian and Sudanese brothers and sisters.”

“We believe in shared progress, shared energy, and shared water,” he said. “Prosperity for one should mean prosperity for all.”

However, the Egyptian water ministry said Friday that Ethiopian statements calling for continued negotiations “are merely superficial attempts to improve its image on the international stage.”

“Ethiopia’s positions, marked by evasion and retreat while pursuing unilateralism, are in clear contradiction with its declared willingness to negotiate,” the statement read.

However, Egypt is addressing its water needs by expanding agricultural wastewater treatment and improving irrigation systems, according to the ministry, while also bolstering cooperation with Nile Basin countries through backing development and water-related projects.