The Blue Nile region in southeastern Sudan has been on fire for a week over a territorial dispute between two tribes. At least 33 dead and 108 injured are to be deplored, according to a press release from the Ministry of Health which reported sixteen stores burned since clashes broke out on Monday July 11, following a land dispute between the Hausa tribes and Barti, in the district of Qissan.
“We need troop reinforcements to regain control of the situation”, asked Adel Agar, from the municipality of Al-Roseires, while doctors from the city’s hospital also called for reinforcements in the face of the growing number of wounded. According to Mr. Agar, many people, including the injured, sought refuge in police stations. He was unable to give an assessment but pleaded for the rapid intervention of a mediator. Soldiers have been deployed and a curfew imposed from Saturday.
A dignitary of the Hausa explained to Agence France Presse (AFP), on condition of anonymity, that the conflict had degenerated because his clan had been claiming for a long time “the formation of a local civil authority to oversee access to land, which the Bartis refuse”. On the Barti side, a dignitary who also refused to have his name revealed, said his clan had responded “to a violation of the lands of the Bartis” by the Hausa. “These lands are ours, so if we want to form a local authority, it will be made up only of Bartis and not Hausa”he hammered.
Resurgence of tribal violence
The violence, after a brief respite, resumed on Saturday near the local capital of Al-Damazine. “We heard shots” et “saw columns of smoke rising”, Fatima Hamad, a resident of Al-Roseires, told AFP. This city is only separated from Al-Damazine, the capital of the Blue Nile 800 kilometers south of Khartoum, by a bridge over the Nile. A resident of Al-Damazine, Ahmed Youssef, claimed to have seen “dozens of families, especially women and children” cross to escape the fighting.
Nearby hospitals have launched an urgent appeal for blood donations and a source at Al-Roseires hospital told AFP that the hospital was short of first aid equipment. The UN envoy to Sudan Volker Perthes claimed “concrete steps to move towards peaceful coexistence”calling for “stop retaliation”. As of late Saturday, the situation was improving in Qissan while clashes continued in Al-Roseires, Blue Nile Governor Ahmed Al-Omda told state television.
The state of Blue Nile, has been plagued by a rebellion since 1983. The southern guerrillas have long been a thorn in the side of the dictatorship of Omar Al-Bashir, ousted by the army under pressure from the streets in 2019 For experts, the security vacuum created by the putsch carried out in October by its former army commander, General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhane, has favored a resurgence of tribal violence in a country where each year hundreds of civilians die in clashes between herders and farmers for access to water or land.