Smoke rises during clashes between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces , in Omdurman, Sudan July 4, 2023. REUTERS/Mostafa Saied/FILE PHOTO
CAIRO — At least 22 people were killed and scores injured in an air strike by Sudan’s army on western Omdurman, the Khartoum state health ministry said on Saturday, as the war between the country’s military factions entered its 12th week. While the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces quickly dominated the capital Khartoum and its sister cities Omdurman and Bahri after fighting broke out on April 15, the army has launched air and artillery strikes.The fighting, for which no mediation efforts have succeeded thus far, threatens to drag the country into a wider civil war, drawing in other internal and external actors in the East African nation that lies between the Horn of Africa, Sahel, and Red Sea.
Tensions between both sides had grown in the months leading up to the war over the chain of command and integration of their forces under a new transition to democracy.