Sudanese Defence Minister Awad Mohamed Ahmed Ibn Auf, the man behind ex-president Omar al-Bashir step-down from the rule and at the helm of country’s transitional government, was born in the 50s in a rural north Sudan village and is a graduated cadet from the Military Academy in Khartoum.
Before going on to hold a teaching position at the Command & Staff College, he was trained in Egypt. Auf, after joining the army, became an artillery chief. He was later Head of Military Intelligence, and also Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
After his whopping success as chair of the security committee of Eritrean-Sudanese negotiations, Auf was awarded the post of Director of Crisis Management at the Foreign Ministry and the title of Ambassador after retiring from the army in 2010. Growing his diplomatic career, Auf was appointed Consul General of Sudan in Egypt and then represented his country as Ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman.
But it wasn’t long before Auf resumed a role as an army man--a presidential decree appointed the top brass as defense minister in August 2015. Climbing further up the ladder of governance, Auf was assigned to the vice president post, replacing former vice president Bakri Hassan Saleh, all while retaining his post as defense minister.
Auf’s military legacy is credited for revamping the military establishment’s artillery and making the Sudan home to Africa’s longest-reaching missile system.
He also served as Director of the General Secretariat of the Sudanese Socialist Union, the ruling party in the regime of former President Gaafar Nimeiry (1969-1985) and then moved to work as Director of the Foreign Intelligence Service. Auf’s name gained notoriety when a UN fact-finding commission found him complicit in the 2003 Darfur war crimes, which cost the lives of more than 300,000 people and left the region riddled in untold poverty.
It is worth mentioning that Auf was on a May 2007 list of individuals sanctioned by the United States due to his alleged role as a liaison between the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed-staged genocide in the Darfur War.
