KHARTOUM, June 3 (Reuters) – The paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has taken control of Sudan’s national museum, its deputy director said on Saturday, who urged fighters to protect national heritage, including mummies millennia.
Members of the RSF, which has been fighting the army since mid-April to take control of Sudan, entered the museum on Friday, deputy director Ikhlas Abdellatif said.
Museum staff do not know the situation inside the establishment, which has been closed since the conflict broke out on April 15, and the police had to leave the premises, added Ikhlas Abdellatif.
A fighter filmed inside the museum denied wanting to harm the museum and invited any person or organization wanting to make checks to go there, shows a video released by the FSR.
FSR members could also be seen in the video covering the exposed mummies with sheets and closing the white boxes they were in.
The museum is in a large building on the banks of the Nile, near the central bank in central Khartoum, in an area where some of the heaviest fighting took place.
Among the thousands of priceless objects in the museum are mummies that date back to 2,500 BC and are the oldest and most archaeologically significant in the world.
The facility also contains ancient statues, pottery and murals, as well as artefacts dating from the Stone Age through to Christian and Islamic times, former director Hatim Alnour said.
The fighting continues despite several truces, including one brokered by Saudi Arabia and the United States, to which both sides have adhered. The last was due to expire on Saturday evening.
Residents reported clashes and air and artillery strikes on Saturday afternoon in southern Khartoum and in the northern neighborhoods of the twin cities of Omdurman and Bahri, which lie on either side of the Nile.
After the clashes continued, Washington and Riyadh suspended talks and the United States this week announced sanctions on both sides’ business interests.
The clashes, the most violent in the country for decades, were triggered by a disagreement over the integration of the FSR into the army, a new episode in the tumults linked to the sharing of power set up following the coup. military of 2021, which occurred two years after the fall of autocrat Omar al-Bashir.
On Friday, the United Nations Security Council called on the belligerents to cease hostilities to allow access for humanitarian organizations.
“The army is bombing us and the security forces are dispersed in the streets. The citizens are paying the price of the war,” commented Sami el-Tayeb, a 47-year-old resident of Omdurman.
The conflict has already displaced 1.2 million people inside the country and forced another 400,000 to flee to neighboring states. (Reporting Khalid Abdelaziz in Dubai and Adam Makary in Cairo, written by Angus McDowall; French version Kate Entringer)
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