Sudanese security forces deployed in large numbers on Sunday, setting up roadblocks in the capital Khartoum amid calls for pro-democracy demonstrations in “memory of the martyrs” killed in recent protests.
Communications, including the Internet and phone lines, have been severely restricted, while armed agents blocked key bridges across the Nile River connecting Khartoum to its suburbs.
Web monitoring group NetBlocks said mobile internet services were cut off mid-morning ahead of planned protests, the first of the year.
Activists use the Internet to organize demonstrations and broadcast live images of the rallies.
Sudan, with a long history of military coups, has undergone a fragile journey into civilian rule since the 2019 ouster of autocrat Omar al-Bashir following massive popular protests.
But the country has been in turmoil since the military leader, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the de facto leader since Bashir’s overthrow, launched a coup on October 25 and detained Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok.
Hamdok was reinstated on November 21, but massive protests have continued as protesters distrust veteran General Burhan and his promises to seek to guide the country toward full democracy.
Activists have been campaigning for more than two months of street demonstrations against the army’s seizure of power, despite a crackdown that has killed at least 53 people and injured hundreds in protest-related violence. , according to the Doctors Committee for Democracy. group.
Those demonstrations have been repeatedly broken up by security forces who have fired rounds of tear gas, as well as charges by the police with batons and firing bullets into the air.
On Thursday, five people were shot dead in Khartoum when security forces cracked down on mass demonstrations in which tens of thousands took to the streets shouting “no to the military government”.
On Sunday, soldiers in armored vehicles mounted with heavy machine guns were posted at strategic road crossings, an AFP reporter said.
Activists say 2022 will be “the year of continued resistance” in posts on social media.
They demand justice both for the dozens killed since the coup, and for the more than 250 killed during the massive protests that began in 2019 and that paved the way for Bashir’s overthrow.
More than 14 million people, one in three Sudanese, will need humanitarian aid next year, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the highest level in a decade.