General Jamal Omar (C), a member of Sudan's Transitional Military
Council who on July 11, 2019 announced that the council had foiled a
coup attempt and 16 people arrested. PHOTO | ASHRAF SHAZLY | AFP
Khartoum
Sudan's
ruling military council foiled a coup attempt, a top general announced
on state television Thursday, saying that 12 officers and four soldiers
had been arrested.
The announcement came as the ruling
military and civilian protesters agreed last week to end a political
impasse after the army in April ousted long-time ruler Omar Al-Bashir on
the back of a popular uprising.
"Officers and soldiers
from the army and National Intelligence and Security Service, some of
them retired, were trying to carry out a coup," General Jamal Omar of
the ruling military council said in a statement broadcast live on state
television.
ARRESTED
"The regular forces were able to foil the attempt," he said, but did not say when the attempt was made.
Omar said of the 12 officers arrested, five of them were
retired, and that security forces were looking for the mastermind of the
attempted coup.
"This is an attempt to block the
agreement which has been reached by the Transitional Military Council
and the Alliance for Freedom and Change that aims to open the road for
Sudanese people to achieve their demands," Omar said.
The
announcement late Thursday came as the generals and protest leaders
went through the details of the agreement at a luxury hotel in Khartoum.
The
two sides held intense discussions through the night into the early
hours of Friday and later agreed to continue on Saturday, mediators told
reporters.
AGREEMENT
The
landmark agreement that aims to form a new joint transitional
civilian-military ruling body was reached last week after mediation by
African Union and Ethiopian envoys.
The forming of the
new governing body is the first step towards installing an overall
transitional civilian administration in Sudan as demanded by
demonstrators.
Sudan has been rocked by a political crisis since protests first erupted against Bashir's rule in December.
The
protests finally led to the army ousting him on April 11, but the
generals who seized power have so far resisted demonstrators' demands to
hand it over to a civilian administration.
BRUTAL RAID
Tension
had further soared between the two sides after a brutal raid on a
longstanding protest camp outside army headquarters in the capital
Khartoum that killed dozens of demonstrators and wounded hundreds on
June 3.
The raid came after talks between the generals
and protest leaders collapsed in May over who should lead the new
governing body – a civilian or soldier.
Intense
mediation by African Union and Ethiopian mediators finally led to the
agreement reached on the new joint governing body on July 5.
The
agreement proposes a little more than a three-year transition period,
with the president of the new ruling body to be held by the military for
the first 21 months and a civilian for the remaining 18 months.
The ruling body would comprise of six civilians, including five from the protest movement, and five of the military.
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