Region

KHARTOUM — Sudanese security forces have raided the offices of an independent committee probing a 2019 crackdown in which more than 100 demonstrators were killed, the head of the inquiry said on Monday. 

“The committee’s offices have been taken over by security forces, who have allowed other civilian authorities to enter,” lawyer Nabil Adeeb said in a statement. Committee members were “not allowed to retrieve the inquiry’s material”, he said. 

“The committee has decided to stop its operations until after its offices have been evacuated by those who raided it”. 

“We need to ensure that no documents have been tampered with, and conduct a security check to ensure there remains no equipment which could be used to reveal security secrets.” 

Last October, military chief Abdel Fattah Al Burhan led a coup that derailed a fragile power-sharing arrangement between the army and civilians that had been painstakingly negotiated after the 2019 ouster of Omar Al Bashir. 

This is the second such committee targeted since the coup, after a panel set up to recover wealth looted by the Bashir regime was suspended in November. 

Two panel members, accused of embezzlement by Burhan in the media, are behind bars awaiting formal charges. 

Pro-democracy activists have accused Burhan’s new military administration of seeking to reinstall the security and political apparatus of the old regime. 

An initial investigation into the 2019 crackdown had incriminated the feared paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), commanded by General Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, Burhan’s number two. 

The 2019 sit-in had initially demanded the removal of Bashir. 

After the autocrat stepped down in April of that year following months of demonstrations, protests continued to demand the transfer of power to civilian rule. 

On June 3, 2019, armed men in military fatigues violently dispersed a protest camp outside army headquarters. 

The crackdown left 128 people dead, according to medics linked to the protest movement. Later that year, civilian premier Abdalla Hamdok, who assumed power at the head of a transitional government, set up the investigation committee into the crackdown. 

The inquiry had yet to announce findings when Hamdok’s civilian government was toppled last October. 

Protests are ongoing in the country to demand a return to civilian rule and justice for those killed in demonstrations, including at the June 2019 sit-in.

DUBAI — Yemen’s Houthi rebels have signed a UN agreement hoped to help stop a rusting oil tanker in the Red Sea becoming an ecological and humanitarian catastrophe, officials said on Monday. 

The 45-year-old FSO Safer, long used as a floating oil storage platform with 1.1 million barrels of crude on board, has been moored off Yemen’s western Red Sea port of Hodeida since 2015, without being serviced. 

Houthi leaders and David Gressly, the UN humanitarian coordinator for war-torn Yemen, signed a “memorandum of understanding [MoU]” on a “framework for cooperation on the UN-coordinated proposal to resolve the threat posed by the FSO Safer”, UN spokesman Russell Geekie said. 

The UN proposal includes pumping the toxic cargo from the tanker to another ship, but remains dependent on raising donor cash to fund the work. 

The UN has said an oil spill could destroy ecosystems, shut down the fishing industry and close Yemen’s lifeline Hodeida Port for six months. 

“The MoU... would include a short-term solution to eliminate the immediate threat by moving the million barrels of oil aboard the Safer to an oil tanker, as well as a long-term solution,” Geekie said. 

The agreement was signed on Saturday, he said. 

Senior Houthi official Mohammed Ali Al Houthi said on Sunday that he hoped that work will be able “to avoid a disaster”. 

Apart from corrosion to the ageing hull, essential work on reducing explosive gases in the storage tanks has been neglected for years. 

Greenpeace has warned the vessel could “explode at any moment”. 

Independent studies show it could expose more than 8.4 million Yemenis to heightened pollution. 

Maritime traffic and coastal countries including Djibouti, Eritrea and Saudi Arabia could also be affected. 

Yemen’s civil war broke out in 2014 when the Houthis seized the capital Sanaa, prompting a Saudi-led military coalition to intervene the following year to prop up the internationally recognised government. 

Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed directly or indirectly in the conflict, while millions have been displaced in what the UN calls the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis.

BEIRUT — Fifteen soldiers died on Sunday in a Daesh group attack on an army bus in the central Syrian desert, a war monitor said, as state media reported a “terrorist attack”.

Despite the fall of Daesh’s “caliphate” in 2019, the group continues to launch deadly attacks from hideouts in the Syrian desert, which extends from the outskirts of the capital Damascus to the Iraqi border.

Daesh cells “attacked a military bus” in the Palmyra desert, “killing 15 soldiers and wounding 18 others”, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

State news agency SANA had reported 13 dead “including officers” and 18 wounded in a “terrorist attack” on a military bus on Sunday afternoon.

The observatory, which relies on a network of sources across the country, said the death toll could rise as most of the soldiers were “seriously wounded”.

Daesh did not immediately claim responsibility for the attack.

Sunday’s violence came after three regime soldiers died Friday east of Palmyra when the vehicle they were travelling in came under attack, the observatory added.

So far this year 61 pro-regime soldiers and Iran-affiliated militiamen had been killed in Daesh attacks in the desert of Syria, it said.

About half a million people have been killed and millions have been displaced since the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011, after nationwide protests against the government were met with a brutal crackdown.

It escalated into a devastating war that drew in regional and international powers.

Daesh leader Abu Ibrahim Al Hashimi Al Qurashi blew himself up in early February during a raid by US forces on his house in Syria’s northwest region of Idlib, Syria’s last major opposition bastion.

Qurashi had taken over with Daesh weakened by years of assaults by US-backed local forces and the loss of its self-proclaimed “caliphate” in Syria and northern Iraq.

Daesh ruled with brutality over the “caliphate” which it had proclaimed in 2014.

The majestic ancient city of Palmyra, a World Heritage site, became the scene of public executions, where Daesh also blew up ancient monuments and looted other treasures.

In January Daesh fighters launched their biggest assault in years, attacking a prison in the Kurdish-controlled northeast Syrian city of Hasakeh, aiming to free fellow militants.

Almost a week of intense fighting left more than 370 dead, according to the observatory.

Earlier in January, nine Syrian soldiers and allied fighters were killed in an attack on a military convoy in Syria’s east, while in November last year, the observatory said another eastern Syria attack left a general and four soldiers dead.

Two bombs planted on an army bus in central Damascus killed 14 people in October last year, SANA had reported.

That was the deadliest attack in the capital since a bombing claimed by Daesh targeted the Justice Palace in March 2017, killing at least 30 people.

DUBAI — An armed group has kidnapped two foreigners working with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Yemen’s east, a government source said on Sunday, as the charity confirmed it had “lost contact” with some staff.

Over the years a number of foreigners have been abducted in Yemen by the country’s heavily armed tribes and there have also been some kidnappings by extremists. Iran-backed Houthi rebels, fighting a seven-year war with the government, have also detained several Westerners but most were later released.

“An armed group kidnapped two MSF workers, one a German national and the other Mexican, in Hadramawt,” a Yemeni interior ministry source told AFP, adding that a “military campaign” was underway to track down the kidnappers.

Hadramawt is a large Yemeni province under the control of the internationally recognised government.

MSF on Sunday confirmed that it had “lost contact with some of our staff in Yemen”.

“Out of concern for the safety of our colleagues we cannot share more details at this point,” the medical aid group told AFP.

Last month, the United Nations said five of its staff members were abducted in the southern province of Abyan while returning to the port city of Aden “after having completed a field mission”.

Al Qaeda’s Yemen branch — Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula — and militants loyal to the Daesh group, have thrived in the chaos of Yemen’s civil war.

The conflict began in 2014 after Houthi rebels seized the capital Sanaa and continued advancing. A Saudi-led military coalition intervened to prop up the government the following year.

The UN has estimated the war killed 377,000 people by the end of 2021, both directly and indirectly through hunger and disease while millions have been displaced, in what it calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel’s premier stepped into the role of mediator on Saturday as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine intensified, holding a three-hour meeting at the Kremlin with Vladimir Putin before calling Ukraine’s president and flying to Berlin.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s sit-down with Putin was the first by foreign leader since the day Russian forces invaded Ukraine last week and came after Kyiv had asked Israel to launch a dialogue with Moscow.

Bennett has so far walked a very cautious line on the Ukraine crisis, seeking to preserve delicate security cooperation with Russia, which has a large military presence in Israel’s northern neighbour, Syria. Bennett has not joined Western leaders — notably key ally the United States — in forcefully condemning the invasion, instead stressing Israel’s strong relations with both Russia and Ukraine.

Ahead of his Moscow trip, Bennett had spoken by telephone repeatedly with both Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Bennett and Putin met for three hours, in a visit that was coordinated with the US, Germany and France, an Israeli official said.

Bennett’s delegation included his housing minister, fluent Russian speaker Zeev Elkin, who was born in Ukraine when it was part of the Soviet Union.

The Kremlin said “different aspects of the situation in Ukraine” were discussed during “the short working visit”.

After the Putin meeting, Bennett called Zelensky — who is Jewish, has family in Israel and has visited the country many times.

Bennett then headed to Germany for talks with Chancellor Olaf Scholz scheduled for late Saturday.

A statement from the French presidency said Emmanuel Macron also spoke to Bennett before he left for Moscow on Saturday, as part of joint efforts to “obtain a ceasefire in Ukraine”.

Iran 

While the Bennett-Putin talks were primarily focused on the fighting in Ukraine, the meeting also “touched upon the progress of the [Iran] nuclear talks in Vienna”, the Israeli official said.

Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency said earlier Saturday after talks in Tehran that they agreed on an approach to resolve issues crucial in efforts to revive the country’s 2015 nuclear deal.

Bennett is a staunch opponent of global efforts to revive the agreement which gave Iran relief from sanctions in exchange for curbs on its nuclear programme.

The premier has argued that Tehran will use the revenue boost from the lifting of sanctions to buy weapons that can harm Israel, while still pursuing a nuclear weapons capability, an ambition Iran denies.

Russia, which has itself been slapped with Western sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine, said Saturday that it would seek guarantees from Washington before backing any revived agreement, complicating efforts for a rapid deal.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia had requested that the US give it written guarantees that Ukraine-related sanctions “will not in any way harm our rights to free, fully-fledged trade and economic and investment cooperation, military-technical cooperation with Iran”.

There was no immediate comment on any link between the new Russian position and Bennett’s visit.

The meeting with Bennett was the first the Russian leader had scheduled since he ordered the invasion of Ukraine.

Putin received Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan at the Kremlin on the day the invasion began, in a visit that was long scheduled but widely considered ill-timed.

On Monday, Khan defended the trip — the first by a Pakistani leader to Russia in more than two decades — saying it would prove beneficial in the future.

TEHRAN — Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Saturday after talks in Tehran that they agreed on an approach to resolve issues crucial in efforts to revive the country's 2015 nuclear deal.

The announcement came shortly before Russia said it would seek guarantees from the United States before it backs the deal, potentially scuppering hopes an agreement could be wrapped up quickly.

IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said the UN agency and Iran "did have a number of important matters that we needed... to resolve", but that they had now "decided to try a practical, pragmatic approach" to overcome them.

Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran President Mohammed Eslami said the two sides had come to the "conclusion that some documents which need to be exchanged between the IAEA and the Iranian organisation should be exchanged" by May 22.

Grossi's visit to Tehran comes after Britain, one of the parties to parallel talks on the deal in Vienna, indicated an agreement was close.

The 2015 nuclear deal has been hanging by a thread since then US president Donald Trump pulled out in 2018 and reimposed sweeping sanctions, including on Iran's vital oil and gas exports.

The landmark accord was aimed at guaranteeing Tehran could not develop a nuclear weapon — something it has always denied wanting to do.

Iran said this week that it was ready to raise its crude exports to pre-sanctions levels within one to two months of a deal being signed.

The next few days are widely seen as a decisive point for negotiations on reviving the accord formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA.

"We are close," British delegation head Stephanie Al Qaq said on Friday.

But Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Saturday that Moscow, itself slapped with sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine, would seek guarantees from Washington before backing the nuclear deal.

Lavrov said Russia had requested that the US give it written guarantees that Ukraine-related sanctions “will not in any way harm our rights to free, fully-fledged trade and economic and investment cooperation, military-technical cooperation with Iran”.

Russia is party to the ongoing talks in the Austrian capital to restore the agreement along with Britain, China, France and Germany. The United States is participating indirectly.

Iranian international relations analyst Fayaz Zahed said the government needed to be very careful that Moscow did not scupper a deal in defence of its own interests.

“Now that Russia is under sanctions, it is perhaps no longer interested in resolving the Iran nuclear issue, a position that could be very damaging,” he said.

Grossi vowed this week that the IAEA would “never abandon” its attempts to get Iran to clarify the presence in the past of nuclear material at several undeclared sites.

Iran has said the closure of the probe is necessary to clinch a deal.

Behrouz Kamalvandi, deputy head of the Iranian atomic agency, told state television he was hopeful Iran would reach an agreement with the IAEA during Grossi’s visit.

Grossi is expected to hold a news conference on his return to Vienna.

‘Work ongoing’ 

The coming days are seen as pivotal by the West because of the rate at which Iran is making nuclear advances.

Its stockpile of enriched uranium has now reached more than 15 times the limit set out in the 2015 accord, the IAEA said this week.

Several observers believe the West could leave the negotiating table and chalk the deal up to a failure if a compromise is not reached this weekend.

The EU has been chairing nuclear deal negotiations and the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Friday he “hopes to have results this weekend” to “resurrect the agreement”.

He stressed there was “still work ongoing”.

On Thursday, US State Department deputy spokeswoman Jalina Porter said negotiators were “close to a possible deal”, but that “a number of difficult issues” remained unresolved.

However, “if Iran shows seriousness, we can and should reach an understanding of mutual return to full implementation of the JCPOA within days”, she said.