Port Sudan — The Sudan Liberation Movement under leadership of Minni Arko Minawi (SLM-MM), and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) led by Jibril Ibrahim, have announced their renunciation of the neutrality pledged in the September 2020 Juba Peace Agreement, and their preparedness "to participate in military operations on all fronts without hesitation".
The Darfur armed movements SLM-MM and the JEM say they will abandon the neutrality pledged as part of the Juba Peace Agreement, and enter the fray in support of the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), who have been fighting a civil war against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) since mid-April.
After meeting with leaders of European countries and organisations, ambassadors, and decision-makers, Minni Arko Minawi, head of the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM-MM) and governor of the Darfur region, told a news conference in Port Sudan yesterday that 50 members of the joint force of the armed movements in Darfur were killed while securing convoys, civilians, markets, banks, and roads.
Minawi says that he realised the importance of abandoning neutrality after confirming that "the goal of the war is to divide Sudan".
He reiterated his condemnation of the cold-blooded assassination of the governor of West Darfur, the mutilation of his body and the killing and rape of people from Zalingei in the camps.
He referred to the systematic killing in the captured towns of Zalingei, El Geneina, Kutum, and Tawila, in a manner he described as "selective" and accused the RSF of "liquidating community activists and leaders and supplying weapons to the parties to the civil wars in South Darfur".
'Foreign agenda'
EM leader Jibril Ibrahim told the press conference that his organisation "took a position of neutrality at the beginning of the war in order to mediate", however he accused the RSF of "seeking to fragment and divide the country in partnership with foreign militias and mercenaries," accusing them of "implementing a foreign agenda".
Chad
The statement by the armed movements also accused Chad of supporting the RSF, and "supplying it with military equipment and mercenaries by opening its territory and airspace." He also accused other countries in the region, which he did not name, of supporting the RSF.
Ibrahim said that the abandonment of neutrality by the armed struggle movements is "a position long awaited by the Sudanese people".
"We took the principle of neutrality in order to mediate," he said at the press conference, adding, "We also needed to catch our breath before returning to fight again."
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"We are not neutral in human rights, the killing of civilians and the violation of symptoms, what happened in Sudan cannot be watched," he said.
He stressed their commitment to defending the unity of Sudan
No agreement with RSF
Jibril Ibrahim flatly denied claims yesterday by RSF second-in-command Abdelahim Dagalo that any agreement has been made with the RSF to create any joint force to secure Darfur. He described Dagalo's statement published by the RSF on their electronic platforms as "confusion".
"We cannot agree with them with blood on their hands, and they are accused of violating human rights," he says.
He stressed that the war has harmed the people of Sudan, and it is necessary to work together to stop the war, stressing the need to seek a peaceful solution through well-known platforms.
