World News
Home > World News
Sudan protest group makes strike call with talks deadlocked
TIWN
TIWN
PHOTO : TIWN
KHARTOUM (Reuters), May 21 (TIWN) - Sudan's main protest group called on Tuesday for a general strike, saying two late-night negotiation sessions with the military had failed to reach a deal on how to lead the country after the overthrow of former president Omar al-Bashir.
An alliance of protest and opposition organisations is demanding civilians head a new Sovereign Council which is meant to oversee a three-year transition towards democracy.
But the Sudanese Professionals Association (SPA) protest group said the army was still insisting on directing the transition and keeping a military majority on the council.
"Civilian power means that the structure is fully civilian with a civilian majority in all its parts," the SPA said in a statement. It said members should mobilise for a strike, without giving a date.
The impasse has hit hopes of a quick recovery from the political turmoil that climaxed in the end of Bashir's three-decade rule on April 11.
Several powers including wealthy Gulf Arab states are trying to influence the path of the country of 40 million, which straddles a volatile region between the Middle East and sub-Saharan Africa.
The former Islamist general, under whose rule Sudan was placed on a U.S. list of sponsors of terrorism, was ousted by the army after months of protests against soaring prices, cash shortages and other economic hardships.
The army set up a Transitional Military Council (TMC) to rule the country and promised to hand over after elections.
But, wary of the example of neighbouring Egypt where the head of the army eventually became president after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak, Sudanese protesters have sought guarantees of civilian control.
Protesters have also been pushing for justice over the deaths of dozens of demonstrators since December and for a crackdown on corruption.
Bashir and some of his aides have been arrested, though on Tuesday guards blocked the arrest of Salah Abdallah Mohamed Saleh, known as Salah Gosh, Bashir's former intelligence chief.
Add your Comment
Comments (0)
More World News
- US election: Democrats eager to defend 'blue wall' Wisconsin
- Australian PM celebrates Diwali, Bandi Chhor Divas in Sydney
- US Election: Harris says Trump shouldn't be telling women what to do with their bodies
- India ties: Trump has track of engagements, Harris's record sparse littered with Kashmir statements
- S.Korea, NASA to send co-developed solar coronagraph to ISS