At least four people have been killed by Sudanese security forces during anti-coup demonstrations near the capital Khartoum on Thursday, the civilian-allied Sudanese Central Doctors Committee (SCDC) said.
Authorities fired live rounds and tear gas to crackdown on protesters in Omdurman, about 25 kilometers northwest of the capital. A number of people had been injured and admitted into hospital.
Thousands of Sudanese demonstrators joined new protests Thursday against the army’s October 25 coup, braving tear gas, the cutting of communication links and a tight lockdown in the capital.
The protesters reached within a few hundred meters of the presidential palace in Khartoum, headquarters of military chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, before troops, police and paramilitary units launched multiple tear gas canisters into the crowd.
The activists are calling for a transition to civilian rule. Witnesses reported similar anti-coup protests in Madani, south of the capital, and the cities of Kassala and Port Sudan in the east.
Civil rights activists have sustained the campaign of street demonstrations against the army’s takeover, despite a crackdown that has seen at least 48 people die in protest-related violence, according to the independent Doctors’ Committee.
The security forces had deployed in strength across Khartoum in anticipation of Thursday’s anti-coup demonstration.
Army and police patrols criss-crossed the streets, while shipping containers blocked the Nile bridges that connect the capital with its northern suburbs and its twin city Omdurman.
The bridges were blocked off for the last protests on December 26, when tens of thousands took to the streets.
Ahead of Thursday’s protests, new surveillance cameras had been installed on the major thoroughfares along which demonstrators were due to march. For the first time, authorities also cut all phone lines, both international and domestic.
