ISLAMABAD: For more than three days, students at the University of Khartoum have been confined within campus buildings while artillery and gunfire rained down on Sudan’s capital.
Since erupting on Saturday, fierce fighting between the country’s army and a paramilitary group has spread across the country, but the university area is a particular hotspot due to its proximity to the General Command of the Armed Forces, with warplanes hovering overhead and nearby buildings destroyed by fire.
Food and water are running low, but leaving is out of the question because one student was already murdered by gunfire outside. According to Farouk, Khalid Abdulmun’em was attempting to run to the library from an adjacent building when he was struck. He claimed, the students collected his body and brought it inside. In a Facebook post, the institution confirmed Abdulmun’em’s death, stating he was shot in the campus’s surroundings. In a subsequent post on Monday, the institution asked humanitarian organizations to assist in the evacuation of dozens of people who were stranded on campus.
In a brutal power struggle between Sudan’s military leader, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, popularly known as Hemedti, head of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Khartoum has been plagued by bloodshed and anarchy. The two leaders have traded accusations of starting the conflict and violating interim ceasefires. Meanwhile, civilians are bearing the brunt of the damage, with at least 180 people killed and 1,800 injured, according to UN officials on Monday.
A 6-year-old child was killed on Monday after the RSF shelled a hospital in Khartoum and damaged a maternity wing. Medics were compelled to escape, leaving behind patients, some of whom were infants in incubators. According to Sudan’s Doctors Trade Union, both warring parties have targeted at least a half-dozen hospitals.
Diplomats and humanitarian workers have been targeted as well. On Monday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed an attack on a US diplomatic convoy.
