Il Nuovo Postiglione - Sudan paramilitaries vow 'no surrender' after Khartoum setback

From inside the recaptured presidential palace, Sudan's army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, at war with his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo since April 2023, had on Wednesday declared the capital "free" from the RSF.

But in its first direct comment since the army retook what remains of the capital's state institutions this week, the RSF said: "Our forces have not lost any battle, but have repositioned.

"Our forces will continue to defend the homeland’s soil and secure a decisive victory. There will be no retreat or surrender," it said.

"We will deliver crushing defeats to the enemy on all fronts."

AFP could not independently confirm the RSF's remaining positions in the capital.

The war has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted more than 12 million, according to UN figures.

It has also split Africa's third-largest country in two, with the army holding the north and east while the RSF controls parts of the south and nearly all of the vast western region of Darfur, which borders Chad.

On Wednesday, the army cleared Khartoum airport of RSF fighters and encircled their last major stronghold in the Khartoum area, just south of the city centre.

An army source told AFP that RSF fighters were fleeing across the Jebel Awliya bridge, their only way out of greater Khartoum.

A successful withdrawal could link the RSF's Jebel Awliya troops to its positions west of the city and then to its strongholds in Darfur hundreds of kilometres (miles) away.

On Wednesday, hours after Burhan arrived in the presidential palace for the first time in two years, the RSF announced a "military alliance" with a rebel group, which controls much of South Kordofan state and parts of Blue Nile bordering Ethiopia.

The Sudan People's Liberation Movement-North, led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, had clashed with both sides, before signing a political charter with the RSF last month to establish a rival government.

- 'No desire' to govern -

Following a year and a half of defeats at the hands of the RSF, the army began pushing through central Sudan towards Khartoum late last year.

Analysts have blamed the RSF's losses on strategic blunders, internal divisions and dwindling supplies.

Since the army recaptured the presidential palace on Friday, witnesses and activists have reported RSF fighters in retreat across the capital.

The army's gains have been met with celebrations in its wartime headquarters in the Red Sea coastal city of Port Sudan, where displaced Sudanese rejoiced at the prospect of finally returning to Khartoum.

"God willing, we're going home, we'll finally celebrate Eid in our own homes," Khartoum native Motaz Essam told AFP, ululations and fireworks echoing around him.

Burhan, Sudan's de facto leader since he ousted civilian politicians from power in a 2021 coup, said on Wednesday the army was looking to form a technocratic government and had "no desire to engage in political work".

"The armed forces are working to create the conditions for an elected civilian government," Burhan said in a meeting with Germany's envoy to the Horn of Africa, Heiko Nitzschke, according to a statement from Burhan's office.

The RSF has its origins in the Janjaweed militia unleashed by then strongman Omar al-Bashir more than two decades ago in Darfur.

Like the army, the RSF has sought to position itself as the guardian of Sudan's democratic uprising which ousted Bashir in 2019.

The United States has imposed sanctions on both sides. It accused the army of attacks on civilians and said the RSF had "committed genocide".

Burhan and Daglo, in the fragile political transition that followed Bashir's overthrow, forged an alliance which saw both rise to prominence. Then a bitter power struggle over the potential integration of the RSF into the regular army erupted into all-out war.

M.Lombardi--INP