Sudan extends ceasefire by five days

The warring parties in Sudan have agreed on a five-day extension, according to the U.S. State Department.

This comes just a few hours before the end of a fragile ceasefire on Monday.

Saudi Arabia and the United States, which is mediating between Sudanese forces and the rival Rapid Support Forces (RSF), welcomed the agreement.

A ten-day ceasefire, which would have expired at midnight (2200 GMT), had been extended by five days by both parties, the U.S. State Department announced on Twitter.

The extension would allow time for the delivery of further humanitarian aid, the restoration of essential services and further negotiations on a longer-term solution, the department added.

While the ceasefire has not been fully observed so far, some 2 million Sudanese had received humanitarian aid in recent days, it said.

The UN World Food Programme said on Monday it had been able to start distributing food in Khartoum on Saturday and had already reached thousands of people.

Recently, there have been repeated reports of shootings, airstrikes, bombings and looting in the capital Khartoum.

The Sudanese army and RSF accuse each other of being responsible for breaking the ceasefire.

According to the coordinator of the UN refugee agency in Darfur, there has also been heavy fighting in the west of the country recently.

Humanitarian aid has therefore not yet reached this region.

The army under the command of de facto president Abdel Fattah al-Burhan is fighting the paramilitary units of his former deputy Mohammed Hamdan Daglo.

The two generals seized power together in 2021, but later fell out.

dpa/NAN