Since April of 2023, Sudan has been engulfed in a brutal civil war involving opposing factions of the military duopoly government that had been in control of the nation. The belligerents in the war include the internationally recognised Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Force, whose origins lie in coalitions of militia forces known as the Janjaweed, who have been active since the Second Sudanese Civil War, which precedes the current conflict by about two decades.
Since the outbreak of violence, nearly 200,000 people have been killed (though this is a conservative estimate), 12 million people have been displaced and a further 25 million face famine, with reports of acutely malnourished children also in the millions. During that period, several diplomatic efforts by other governments and bodies have aimed to achieve peace. These efforts more often than not failed in that pursuit. Peace talks, mediations and ceasefires have all devolved back into violence within hours or days.
Background
Conflict in Sudan has been a recurring struggle in the country since its independence. Fifty of the country’s 69 sovereign years have been spent under military rule, interspersed with brief periods of democracy. In that time, there have been 20 separate Coup attempts, seven of which were successful, A genocide and three civil wars (1955-1972, 1983-2005 and 2023 to present). Although both conflicts are closely interlinked, the second lays much of the groundwork for the present-day conflict, i.e., the Third Sudanese Civil War (2023 to present).
Conflict in Sudan has often followed ethnoreligious lines. Since the 18th Century, battles and clashes along ethnic lines have defined allegiances, marginalization as well as the appropriation of power. Following the end of the bloody conflict that was the First Sudanese Civil War, which was mainly fought between the Northern elitist Sudanese-Arabs, who mainly held positions of power due to British Colonial administration hangover and the racially different South, who were mainly a Nilotic People, was the Addis Ababa Agreement in 1972.
As part of the agreement, the Southern part of Sudan was to hold cultural and legislative autonomy from the Central Sudanese Government. This period of relative peace lasted for about a decade before President Gaafar Nimeiry violated the agreement by attempting to seize oil reserves in the Southern Autonomous Region of Sudan. This culminated in a coup in 1985, followed by another in 1989, during which Colonel Omar Al-Bashir assumed power amid the second civil war that lasted the next two decades.
The Rapid Support Force
During the second civil war at the turn of the millennium, Al-Bashir relied upon the Janjaweed, a collection of Sudanese-Arab militias, to control different regions in the country, particularly in the War in Darfur in 200,3 which was the scene of a genocide where scholars and journalist charactersied the Janjaweed as perpetrators. Over the next decade, the Janjaweed were incorporated into the Sudanese military apparatus before being rebranded in 2013 as the Rapid Support Force (RSF).
Under the command of Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, the RSF served as a paramilitary force for the Bashiri government until 2019, when pro-democracy protests culminated in the Sudanese Revolution, resulting in the ousting of Al-Bashir, who had been in power for 30 years. During that period, Al-Bashir provided the RSF with numerous resources, including gold mines, bases, and weaponry. A civilian government led by Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok was installed in 2021, only to be briefly deposed by a military alliance comprising the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary RSF. Hamdok’s reinstatement later that year was deeply unpopular among pro-democracy voices in the country.
The Sudanese Civil War (2023 to Present)
Hamdok later resigned in 2022, reverting the nation’s administrative powers to the SAF and, by extension, the RSF, creating a military duopoly with practically no civilian oversight. At this point, the RSF sought integration into the military as a means to achieve legitimacy and protection against dissolution, albeit over the course of 10 years, to preserve autonomy.
The SAF, however, under Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, sought to complete the integration within two years. Disagreements between the two weakened the already precarious relationship between them (The RSF and SAF were “allies of convenience,” not partners). They cooperated in the 2021 coup, but they had different power bases, foreign backers, economic networks, and a long history of mutual distrust. This escalation resulted in the RSF attacking SAF bases, kickstarting the Third Sudanese Civil War.
Reasons for the Failure of Diplomatic Tools in Conflict Prevention in Sudan
The failure of diplomatic efforts in Sudan is not accidental but rather reflects several factors, including structural flaws, incentivised external parties, and an oversimplification of the nature of the conflict. Some of these factors include;
Exclusion of Civilian Bodies
Most mediators did very little to include civilian bodies and actors in diplomatic talks. The exclusion of professional associations, community leaders and bodies such as The Forces of Freedom and Change (FFC) has resulted in the talks focusing less on the country’s population, half of whom face displacement, instead centering on power bargains by the two military bodies. This has also led to a weakened social legitimacy of agreements once they are reached.
Lack of Enforcement Mechanisms
Throughout the conflict, there have been few to no mechanisms for enforcing policy or imposing sanctions in Sudan. Despite multiple violations of ceasefires by both the SAF and RSF, as well as reports of war crimes, there have been no real consequences to either party, further emboldening them. Although mechanisms for this exist, they are heavily restricted.
For instance, Articles 40 and 41 of the United Nations Security Council authorise the UNSC to instruct member states to apply sanctions, as it did in the Darfur conflict in 2005. However, this has been met with resistance from some member states. Russia, which has been building strong ties with Sudan and has close affiliations with the RSF through its own contractor, The Wagner Group, vetoed and blocked early drafts for the imposition of an arms embargo, causing a diplomatic paralysis.
The Economic Motivators of War
Most conflicts resolved through peace often require external peace brokers. While these mediators may have underlying motivations, the need for peace usually supersedes other interests. In Sudan, however, intermediaries have pursued their own interests and backed either the RSF or the SAF, making dialogue almost impossible. For instance, the United Arab Emirates has been accused by several bodies, including the United Nations, Reuters and Human Rights Watch, of supplying the RSF with weapons in exchange for gold. Some observers have noted that the gold trade is central to the war, with both the RSF and SAF using the same trade routes to fund their efforts in near-silent agreement.
The Lack Of Genuine Interest in Peace
While massacres continue to ravage Sudan to the point of blood being visible from satellite imagery from space, there seems to be little interest in reaching a peaceful resolution. As the tides of war have shifted rapidly, with the RSF and SAF gaining and losing territory, both parties remain firmly convinced that they can prevail and maintain control. As such, negotiations for peace are regarded solely as a strategic component of the war effort, not as a means of resolution. This sentiment was echoed by U.S. Special Envoy Tom Perriello in 2024, who said, “We do not yet see enough political appetite from the parties to find a real resolution to this conflict.”
Conclusion
The conflict in Sudan is as multilayered as it is multidimensional and should not be reduced to the competing interests of opposing generals fighting in the name of an entire nation. Within it lie centuries of ethnic, racial and religious tensions as well interference of external actors with vested economic and political interests. The failure of diplomatic efforts largely reflects these factors operating in tandem.
In his article “The Protracted Sudan Conflict and Why Mediation has Failed”, conflict and security analyst posited “For effective conflict resolution, therefore, the underlying issues, which are primarily the control of natural resources and the subsequent socio-economic and political marginalisation, need to be addressed; a fair, inclusive and sustainable mechanism of sharing Sudanese resources domestically.”,highlighting the existing obstacles and the need for a concerted effort to work around them, further likening any mediation attempt devoid of this to being “tantamount to building a house on quicksand.”
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