Demonistrations in Sudan

Sudanese anti-riot police dispersing demonstrators
in downtown Khartoum (FILE PHOTO)

April 4, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – Sudanese police on Monday reacted to two demonstrations by student activists in the capital Khartoum and by hundreds of unemployed youth in the flashpoint region of Kordofan, in the latest crackdown against dissent fueled by worsening economic conditions and revolts being witnessed in some Arab countries.

A string of small anti-government protests in north Sudan over the last two month have failed to gain enough traction and were swiftly squashed by the police supported by members of the country’s National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) who arrested dozens of activists.

Eye-witnessed told Sudan Tribune that anti-riot police units intervened to break up clashes that erupted on Monday at Khartoum University’s main campus between students calling for regime-change and those loyal to the ruling National Congress Party (NCP).

Video footages released by anti-government groups on the social-networking website Facebook have shown a handful of students clapping their hands and chanting anti-government slogans as they marched towards the main gate of Khartoum University campus in downtown Khartoum.

According to ST’s witnesses, NCP-affiliated students attacked the protesting students with metal rods as state security agents arrested and beat 20 students, some of whom sustained injuries, the sources added.

Students allied with the NCP are normally supplied with light weapons and can often act with impunity to squelch any anti-government activities in Sudanese universities.

Meanwhile, hundreds of jobless university graduates demonstrated for nearly two hours in Al-Fula town in the country’s flashpoint region of Kordofan against lack of employment opportunities.

Eye witnesses reported that the police had tried to break up the demonstrators using tear gas and batons but the protestors clashed with police who eventually had to allow the protest to proceed.

The oil-producing region of Kordofan is highly volatile and dominated in part by the well-armed Arab nomadic tribe of Messiriya which was used as a proxy militia by Khartoum during the years of civil war with south Sudan which voted to secede from the north in a referendum this month.