Sudanese Army, Paramilitary RSF to Return to Jeddah Negotiations

Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, on June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP)
Smoke rises over Khartoum, Sudan, on June 8, 2023, as fighting between the Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces continues. (AP)
TT
20

Sudanese Army, Paramilitary RSF to Return to Jeddah Negotiations

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

Sudan's army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces will return to the negotiating table in Jeddah on Thursday, senior US State Department officials said, as a six-month war has taken its toll on the country and on both forces.

The Sudanese army said on Wednesday it accepted the invitation as "negotiations are one of the means that may end the conflict," but that it would not stop fighting. The RSF did not immediately have a statement, but on Wednesday published video of its second-in-command leading soldiers in Nyala, a major war zone.

Fighting broke out in mid-April over plans to integrate troops, four years after the two forces ousted President Omar al-Bashir, and 18 months after they led a coup to oust civilian partners.

Since then, fighting has decimated the capital and other major cities, displacing almost 6 million people and killing thousands.

The United States and Saudi Arabia suspended talks in June after numerous ceasefire violations

"Both sides privately indicated that they are ready to resume talks," said one of the US officials, adding that months of fighting and a humanitarian crisis had weighed on both sides.

Eyewitnesses say that the pace of fighting has slowed in the past week, with both sides resorting to long-range artillery that have rained projectiles on residential neighborhoods.

Military sources say the army has struggled to make repairs to aging warplanes while the RSF has struggled to treat wounded soldiers. Both have had difficulty paying their exhausted forces, the sources said.

The African Union and regional body IGAD would be joining the Jeddah talks, which would initially focus on humanitarian issues, ceasefires, and confidence-building measures in order to lay the groundwork for a negotiated solution to the conflict.

Civilian leaders, who have been holding organizing meetings in Addis Ababa this week, would not be participating in the initial rounds but could be brought in later, as one of the officials said that both sides' failure to protect civilians made clear they were no longer fit to rule the country going forward.

The army's second in command, General Shams el-Din Kabbashi, emerged from the capital earlier this week for the first time since fighting started. In a video, he said the army was ready for negotiations, but "we will not let bygones be bygones."

Despite the army's willingness to talk, diplomats and Sudanese sources say Bashir loyalists, who have heavy influence in the military, reject negotiations and would prefer to continue to rebuild influence as fighting continues.



Hamas Says It Is Investigating Possible Error over Hostage Body

 20 February 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Palestinian Hamas members carry one of the four coffins during the handover of the bodies of four Israeli hostages, killed in the Israeli war on Gaza, to the Red Cross in Khan Younis. (dpa)
20 February 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Palestinian Hamas members carry one of the four coffins during the handover of the bodies of four Israeli hostages, killed in the Israeli war on Gaza, to the Red Cross in Khan Younis. (dpa)
TT
20

Hamas Says It Is Investigating Possible Error over Hostage Body

 20 February 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Palestinian Hamas members carry one of the four coffins during the handover of the bodies of four Israeli hostages, killed in the Israeli war on Gaza, to the Red Cross in Khan Younis. (dpa)
20 February 2025, Palestinian Territories, Khan Younis: Palestinian Hamas members carry one of the four coffins during the handover of the bodies of four Israeli hostages, killed in the Israeli war on Gaza, to the Red Cross in Khan Younis. (dpa)

Hamas said on Friday it was investigating a possible error in identifying human remains handed to Israel under a ceasefire deal as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened retaliation for failing to release the body of hostage Shiri Bibas.

Hamas was due to hand over the bodies of Shiri Bibas and her two sons Kfir and Ariel on Thursday, along with the remains of a fourth hostage under the ceasefire deal that has halted fighting in Gaza since last month.

Four bodies were delivered and the identities of the Bibas boys and the other hostage, Oded Lifshitz, were confirmed.

But Israeli specialists said the fourth body was that of an unidentified woman and not Bibas, who was kidnapped along with her sons and her husband, Yarden, during the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

Basem Naim, a member of the Hamas political bureau, said "unfortunate mistakes" could occur, especially as Israeli bombing had mixed the bodies of Israeli hostages and Palestinians, thousands of whom were still buried in the rubble.

"We confirm that it is not in our values or our interest to keep any bodies or not to abide by the covenants and agreements that we sign," he said in a statement.

Hamas said separately that it would investigate the Israeli assertions and announce the results.

The failure to hand over the body and the staged public handover of the four coffins on Thursday, caused outrage in Israel and drew a threat of retaliation from Netanyahu.

"We will act with determination to bring Shiri home along with all our hostages - both living and dead - and ensure Hamas pays the full price for this cruel and evil violation of the agreement," he said in a video statement, accusing Hamas of acting "in an unspeakably cynical manner" by placing the body of a Gaza woman in the coffin instead of Bibas.

Hamas said in November 2023 that the children and their mother had been killed in an Israeli air strike and Ismail Al-Thawabta, director of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, said Netanyahu "bears full responsibility for killing her and her children."

But the Israeli military said intelligence assessments and forensic analysis of the bodies of the Bibas children indicated that they were deliberately killed by their captors. Chief military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said the boys were killed by the militants "with their bare hands", but gave no details.

Netanyahu gave no details of a possible Israeli response, but the incident underscored the fragility of the ceasefire agreement reached with US backing and with the help of Qatari and Egyptian mediators last month.

SATURDAY EXCHANGE

Six living hostages are due for release on Saturday in exchange for 602 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, according to Hamas, and the start of negotiations for a second phase of the ceasefire is expected in the coming days.

"Hamas must return the hostages as agreed in the ceasefire- the living and the deceased," Israeli military spokesperson Nadav Shoshani said in a statement on social media platform X. "They have to bring Shiri back, and they have to release the 6 living hostages expected tomorrow."

Netanyahu's office confirmed it had been officially informed of the names of the six hostages to be released, which Hamas sources said was expected at around 8.30 a.m. (0630 GMT).

As the tension over the Gaza ceasefire rose, Netanyahu ordered the Israeli military to intensify operations in another Palestinian territory, the occupied West Bank, after a number of explosions blew up buses standing empty in their depots near Tel Aviv.

No casualties were reported but the explosions were a reminder of the campaign of suicide attacks on public transport that killed hundreds of Israeli civilians during the Second Intifada in the early 2000s.

'THEY MAKE A JOKE OF US'

Both sides have repeatedly accused the other of ceasefire violations, with Hamas threatening to delay the release of hostages over what it said was Israel's refusal to allow housing materials and other aid into Gaza, a charge Israel denied.

"It's like they make a joke of us," said 75-year-old Ilana Caspi. "We are so in grief and this is even more, it's like you make a punch again, another one and another one, it's really terrible."

The Red Cross told Reuters it was "concerned and unsatisfied" by the fact that the handover of the bodies had not been conducted privately and in a dignified manner.

Despite the outrage over Shiri Bibas, there was no indication that Israel would not take part in talks over a second phase of the ceasefire deal.

The Israel Hayom newspaper reported that Israeli negotiators were considering seeking an extension of the 42-day ceasefire, to delay moving to a second phase, which would involve talks over hard-to-resolve issues including an end to the war and the future of Hamas in Gaza.