On Wednesday evening, the head of Sudan’s Sovereign Council, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, issued two constitutional decrees, one dissolving the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the other on the repeal of the RSF Law, which authorized the RSF in 2017 to report to the Sudanese army.
According to a statement issued by the Sovereignty Council, its president, “the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, issued today a constitutional decree dissolving the Rapid Support Forces.”
The statement added that Burhan “directed the General Command of the People’s Armed Forces, the General Secretariat of the Sovereignty Council and other concerned authorities to put the decision into effect.”
The decision is based on “the repercussions of these forces’ rebellion against the state, the grave violations they have committed against citizens, and the deliberate sabotage of the country’s infrastructure”, he said.
He added: “In addition to violating the objectives, tasks and principles of its establishment contained in the Rapid Support Forces Law of 2017.”
Burhan “also directed the General Command of the People’s Armed Forces, the General Secretariat of the Sovereignty Council and other concerned authorities to put into effect the decree repealing the Rapid Support Forces Law” of 2017 and its amendments of 2019, a separate statement said.
In January 2017, the Sudanese parliament passed the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) bill, which made the RSF subordinate to the Sudanese army, after they had been affiliated with the Security and Intelligence Service.
The law stipulated at the time that “the Rapid Support Forces are subordinate to the armed forces and are under the order of the Supreme Commander.”
The RSF is a fighting force formed to fight rebels in Darfur, later to protect the border and maintain order, established in 2013 as a force affiliated with the Security and Intelligence Service, and there are no official estimates of its number, but it is certain that it exceeds tens of thousands.
Since mid-April, the army and the Rapid Support Forces have been engaged in clashes that a series of truces have failed to stop, leaving more than 3,000 people dead, most of them civilians, and more than 4 million displaced and refugees inside and outside the country, according to the United Nations.
The army, led by Sovereignty Council President Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the Rapid Support Forces, led by Mohamed Hamdan Daglo “Hemedti”, accuse each other of being responsible for starting the fighting and committing violations during successive truces.
