Sudan’s Army Agrees to Three-Day Truce to Mark Eid

In this photo provided by Maheen S , smoke fills the sky in Khartoum, Sudan, near Doha International Hospital on Friday, April 21, 2023. (Maheen S via AP)
In this photo provided by Maheen S , smoke fills the sky in Khartoum, Sudan, near Doha International Hospital on Friday, April 21, 2023. (Maheen S via AP)
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Sudan’s Army Agrees to Three-Day Truce to Mark Eid

In this photo provided by Maheen S , smoke fills the sky in Khartoum, Sudan, near Doha International Hospital on Friday, April 21, 2023. (Maheen S via AP)
In this photo provided by Maheen S , smoke fills the sky in Khartoum, Sudan, near Doha International Hospital on Friday, April 21, 2023. (Maheen S via AP)

Sudan's army said it had agreed to a three-day truce starting on Friday to enable people to celebrate the Muslim holiday of Eid Al-Fitr following almost a week of fighting between its troops and a rival paramilitary force.

"The armed forces hope that the rebels will abide by all the requirements of the truce and stop any military moves that would obstruct it," an army statement said.

Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) had agreed to the 72-hour truce earlier in the day.

Gunfire tore through residential neighborhoods of the capital Khartoum after the army deployed on foot for the first time in its almost week-long fight with the RSF.

Soldiers and gunmen from the RSF shot at each other in neighborhoods across the city, including during the call for special early morning Eid prayers.

It was not immediately clear when the truce would begin. Gunfire crackled without pause all day, punctuated by the thud of artillery and air strikes. Drone footage showed several plumes of smoke across Khartoum and its Nile sister cities, together one of Africa's biggest urban areas.

The fighting has killed hundreds, mainly in the capital and the west of Sudan, tipping the continent's third-largest country - where about a quarter of people already relied on food aid - into a humanitarian disaster.

With the airport caught in the fighting and the skies unsafe, nations including the United States, Japan, South Korea, Germany and Spain have been unable to evacuate embassy staff.

In Washington, the US State Department said without elaborating that one US citizen in Sudan had been killed. The White House said no decision yet had been made to evacuate American diplomatic personnel but the US was preparing for such an eventuality if it becomes necessary.

Reuters reported on Thursday that the United States was sending a large number of additional troops to its base in Djibouti in case of an eventual evacuation from Sudan.

At least five aid workers have been killed, including three from the World Food Program, which has since suspended its Sudan operation - one of the world's largest food aid missions.

A worker at the International Organization for Migration was killed in the city of El Obeid on Friday, after his vehicle was hit by crossfire as he tried to move his family to safety.

The army has pressed forward, fighting the RSF on the ground after having previously stuck largely to air strikes and artillery shelling across the capital since the power struggle erupted last weekend.

In a statement, the army said it had begun "the gradual cleaning of hotbeds of rebel groups around the capital".



Head of ISIS in Iraq and Syria Has Been Killed, Iraqi Prime Minister Says

This handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister's press office shows Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (R) meeting with Syria's interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani in Baghdad on March 14, 2025. (Iraqi Prime Minister’s Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister's press office shows Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (R) meeting with Syria's interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani in Baghdad on March 14, 2025. (Iraqi Prime Minister’s Press Office / AFP)
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Head of ISIS in Iraq and Syria Has Been Killed, Iraqi Prime Minister Says

This handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister's press office shows Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (R) meeting with Syria's interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani in Baghdad on March 14, 2025. (Iraqi Prime Minister’s Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Iraqi Prime Minister's press office shows Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani (R) meeting with Syria's interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani in Baghdad on March 14, 2025. (Iraqi Prime Minister’s Press Office / AFP)

The head of ISIS in Iraq and Syria has been killed in Iraq in an operation by members of the Iraqi national intelligence service along with US-led coalition forces, the Iraqi prime minister announced Friday.

“The Iraqis continue their impressive victories over the forces of darkness and terrorism,” Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a statement posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Abdallah Maki Mosleh al-Rifai, or “Abu Khadija,” was “deputy caliph” of the militant group and as “one of the most dangerous terrorists in Iraq and the world," the statement said.

A security official said the operation was carried out by an airstrike in Anbar province, in western Iraq. A second official said the operation took place Thursday night but that al-Rifai's death was confirmed Friday. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

The announcement came on the same day as the first visit by Syria’s top diplomat to Iraq, during which the two countries pledged to work together to combat ISIS.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fouad Hussein said at a news conference that “there are common challenges facing Syrian and Iraqi society, and especially the terrorists of ISIS.” He said the officials had spoken “in detail about the movements of ISIS, whether on the Syrian-Iraqi border, inside Syria or inside Iraq” during the visit.

Hussein referred to an operations room formed by Syria, Iraq, Türkiye, Jordan and Lebanon at a recent meeting in Amman to confront ISIS, and said it would soon begin work.

The relationship between Iraq and Syria is somewhat fraught after the fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Al-Sudani came to power with the support of a coalition of Iran-backed factions, and Tehran was a major backer of Assad.

The current interim president of Syria, Ahmed al-Sharaa, was previously known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani and fought as an al-Qaeda militant in Iraq after the US invasion of 2003, and later fought against Assad's government in Syria.

But Syrian interim Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani focused on the historic ties between the two countries.

“Throughout history, Baghdad and Damascus have been the capitals of the Arab and Islamic world, sharing knowledge, culture and economy,” he said.

Strengthening the partnership between the two countries “will not only benefit our peoples, but will also contribute to the stability of the region, making us less dependent on external powers and better able to determine our own destiny,” he said.

The operation and the visit come at a time when Iraqi officials are anxious about an ISIS resurgence in the wake of the fall of Assad in Syria.

While Syria’s new rulers have pursued ISIS cells since taking power, some fear a breakdown in overall security that could allow the group to stage a resurgence.

The US and Iraq announced an agreement last year to wind down the military mission in Iraq of an American-led coalition fighting the ISIS group by September 2025, with US forces departing some bases where they have stationed troops during a two-decade-long military presence in the country.

When the agreement was reached to end the coalition’s mission in Iraq, Iraqi political leaders said the threat of ISIS was under control and they no longer needed Washington’s help to beat back the remaining cells.

But the fall of Assad in December led some to reassess that stance, including members of the Coordination Framework, a coalition of mainly Shiite, Iran-allied political parties that brought al-Sudani to power in late 2022.