The Sudanese anti-coup protesters has rebuilt barricades demolished by security forces during overnight unrest as agitations against military rule enters fourth day.
Seven protesters have been confirmed killed since Monday by morgues in Khartoum and its sister city Omdurman, a health official said, adding that more corpses had since been received, some with wounds caused by “sharp tools”.
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Top general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan — Sudan’s de facto leader since the 2019 ouster of autocrat Omar al-Bashir — on Monday dissolved the fragile government that had been meant to shepherd the country to full civilian rule.
The World Bank and the United States have frozen aid and denounced the army’s power grab, while the African Union has suspended Sudan’s membership over what it labelled the “unconstitutional” takeover.
“Security forces have been trying since yesterday morning to remove all our barricades, firing tear gas and rubber bullets,” said protester Hatem Ahmed, from northern Khartoum.
“But we go and rebuild them as soon as they leave. We will only remove the barricades when the civilian government is back.”
The coup was the latest to have hit the poverty-stricken East African nation, which has experienced only rare democratic interludes since independence in 1956.
Shops have remained closed following calls for a civil disobedience campaign and Sudan’s pro-democracy movements ratcheted up calls for “million-strong protests” on Saturday.
Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, who was detained by the military Monday in sweeping arrests of civilian leaders, remains under guard at his home, where he was moved after an international outcry. Other ministers remain under full military arrest.
A joint statement by the United States, European Union, Britain, Norway and other nations emphasised their continued recognition of the “prime minister and his cabinet as the constitutional leaders of the transitional government”.
Burhan, a senior general during Bashir’s three-decade-long hardline rule, on Wednesday also sacked six Sudanese ambassadors, including to the US, EU, China and France after they sided with the civilian leaders he ousted.
Protesters rallied late into Wednesday night in the capital, said the Sudanese Professionals Association, a union umbrella instrumental in months-long protests that helped oust Bashir in April 2019.
Online videos shared by the SPA showed protesters chanting for “civilian rule”, calling for mass protests on October 30, and demanding that Burhan be taken to Khartoum’s high security Kober prison, where Bashir is incarcerated.
Violence against protesters has mounted in a “vengeful” crackdown by security forces, the SPA said in a statement.
On Wednesday, hundreds of protesters were seen throwing rocks at security forces in Khartoum’s eastern district of Burri.
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The coup has provoked strong international criticism.
