UN urges countries with influence in Africa to help end Sudan conflict

The United Nations has urged countries with influence in Africa to help end the conflict in Sudan after reported progress in truce talks between the army and the rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

UN Sudan envoy Volker Turk said in Geneva on Thursday that both sides had trampled international humanitarian law, and he urged "all states with influence in the region to encourage, by all possible means, the resolution of this crisis".

Western countries condemned abuses by both sides at a human rights meeting in Geneva, but Sudan's envoy there said the conflict was "an internal affair".

Clashes rocked Halfaya, an entry point to the capital, early on Thursday as residents heard warplanes circling over Khartoum and its adjoining sister cities of Bahri and Omdurman, but the fighting appeared calmer than on Wednesday.

Efforts on to end conflict

In public neither side has shown it is ready to offer concessions to end the conflict that erupted suddenly last month, threatening to pitch Sudan into a civil war, killing hundreds of people and triggering a humanitarian crisis.

Army general Yassir Al Atta was quoted on Thursday saying the talks should aim at removing the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) from Khartoum, merging its fighters into the regular military and putting its leaders on trial.

"Any dialogue outside those points is simply delaying the war to another time," he told Asharq Al Awsat newspaper, adding the army had beaten back RSF forces at one key Khartoum location.

The RSF on Wednesday said it held nearly all of Khartoum and accused the army of "unrelenting violations". These accounts, however, could not be independently verified.

The talks in the Saudi port of Jeddah represent the most serious effort yet to stop the fighting and US mediators said on Wednesday they were "cautiously optimistic".

Previous ceasefire agreements have been repeatedly violated, leaving civilians to navigate a terrifying landscape of chaos and bombardment with failing power and water, little food and a collapsing health system.

On Thursday the army warned it would target what it said were RSF fighters in civilian clothes using motorcycles, and warned ordinary residents of the capital not to use the vehicles.