RSF Forms Parallel Civilian Govt in Khartoum

 Smoke billows in southern Khartoum on June 12, 2023 during fighting between Sudan's army and paramilitaries. (AFP)
Smoke billows in southern Khartoum on June 12, 2023 during fighting between Sudan's army and paramilitaries. (AFP)
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RSF Forms Parallel Civilian Govt in Khartoum

 Smoke billows in southern Khartoum on June 12, 2023 during fighting between Sudan's army and paramilitaries. (AFP)
Smoke billows in southern Khartoum on June 12, 2023 during fighting between Sudan's army and paramilitaries. (AFP)

The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan announced the formation of a civilian parallel government in Khartoum, 19 months after seizing the majority of the Sudanese capital, including the presidential palace and various ministries.

The RSF named Abdul Latif Abdullah al-Amin al-Hassan as prime minister and formed a 90-member legislative civilian council that would offer services to the people and restore security.

The council has elected a judicial council and has been sworn in.

The legislative council vowed to provide essential services to the people, protect them and offer them civil assistance. It also vowed to restore state agencies that have collapsed during the war that erupted in April 2023.

Khartoum had been without a government or administration since the cabinet relocated to Port Sudan during the war.

Head of the legislative council, Nael Babakir Nael Al-Mak Nasser, said the vacuum caused by the war led to the collapse in basic and essential services, leading the people to demand the establishment of a civilian administration.

“The people of Khartoum took on this historic responsibility and communicated with the RSF leaderships in the state to request their approval to establish a civilian administration that can offer basic services,” he told a press conference on Friday.

The civilian and judicial councils will cooperate to ensure the services and humanitarian aid reach the people in Khartoum.



Lebanon's New President Says to Ensure State Has Exclusive Right to Carry Arms

This handout photo released by the Lebanese parliament shows Newly elected Lebanese president Joseph Aoun delivering a speech after his election in Beirut, on January 9, 2025. (Photo by LEBANESE PARLIAMENT / AFP)
This handout photo released by the Lebanese parliament shows Newly elected Lebanese president Joseph Aoun delivering a speech after his election in Beirut, on January 9, 2025. (Photo by LEBANESE PARLIAMENT / AFP)
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Lebanon's New President Says to Ensure State Has Exclusive Right to Carry Arms

This handout photo released by the Lebanese parliament shows Newly elected Lebanese president Joseph Aoun delivering a speech after his election in Beirut, on January 9, 2025. (Photo by LEBANESE PARLIAMENT / AFP)
This handout photo released by the Lebanese parliament shows Newly elected Lebanese president Joseph Aoun delivering a speech after his election in Beirut, on January 9, 2025. (Photo by LEBANESE PARLIAMENT / AFP)

Lebanon's newly elected President Joseph Aoun told lawmakers on Thursday that he will work to ensure the state has the exclusive right to carry arms, in his first speech at parliament after he was elected.

His comments were seen partly as a reference to Hezbollah's arsenal, which he had not commented on publicly as the former army commander.

In a first round of voting Thursday, Aoun received 71 out of 128 votes but fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to win outright. Of the rest, 37 lawmakers cast blank ballots and 14 voted for “sovereignty and the constitution.”
In the second round, he received 99 votes.

In his speech in parliament, Aoun also pledged to carry out reforms to the judicial system and fight corruption.

He promised to control the country’s borders and “ensure the activation of the security services and to discuss a strategic defense policy that will enable the Lebanese state to remove the Israeli occupation from all Lebanese territories” in southern Lebanon, where the Israeli military has not yet withdrawn from dozens of villages.

He also vowed to reconstruct “what the Israeli army destroyed in the south, east and (Beirut’s southern) suburbs.”

Thursday’s vote came weeks after a tenuous ceasefire agreement halted a 14-month conflict between Israel and Hezbollah and at a time when Lebanon’s leaders are seeking international assistance for reconstruction.

Aoun said he would call for parliamentary consultations as soon as possible on naming a new prime minister.