US Special Envoy Jeffrey Feltman said on Monday the United States is deeply alarmed at reports of a military takeover of the transitional government in Sudan.
On the official Twitter of the State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs, Feltman warned the military takeover would contravene Sudan’s Constitutional Declaration and puts at risk US assistance to the country.
The first reports about a possible military takeover began trickling out of Sudan before dawn Monday. By mid-morning, the information ministry confirmed that the prime minister, Abdalla Hamdok, had been arrested and taken to an undisclosed location. Several senior government figures were also detained, the ministry said in a Facebook post. It said their whereabouts were unknown.
Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said on Monday that he was following events in Sudan with the utmost concern.
"Following with utmost concern ongoing events in #Sudan. The EU calls on all stakeholders and regional partners to put back on track the transition process," he wrote on his Twitter account.
The United Nations Mission to Sudan issued an emphatic rebuke of what it called an ongoing coup and attempts to undermine the northeast African nation’s fragile democratic transition.
“The reported detentions of the prime minister, government officials and politicians are unacceptable,” said the recently formed UN political mission, which has a mandate to assist the country’s political transition and protect human rights.
The mission called on Sudan’s security forces “to immediately release those who have been unlawfully detained or placed under house arrest” and urged all parties to “exercise utmost restraint.”
Diplomats have joined in a chorus of concern over the events that rocked Sudan on Monday, as Sudanese security forces detained senior government officials in undisclosed locations and thousands flooded the street in protest, two years after mass demonstrations helped topple former president Omar al-Bashir.
Sudan has been on edge since a failed coup plot last month unleashed bitter recriminations between military and civilian groups meant to be sharing power following Bashir’s ouster in 2019.
Bashir was toppled and jailed after months of street protests. A political transition agreed after his ouster has seen Sudan emerge from its isolation under three decades of rule by Bashir and was meant to lead to elections by the end of 2023.