Sudanese security forces shot dead two people Saturday during mass protests against the country's recent military coup, a doctors union said. The shootings came despite repeated appeals by the West to Sudan's new military rulers to show restraint and allow peaceful protests, per the AP. During the protests, thousands of Sudanese marched into the streets, chanting "Revolution, revolution!" to the sound of whistles and drums, to protest against the coup that's threatening to derail the country's fitful transition to democracy.
The Sudan Doctors Committee, a professional union, said security forces shot dead two people in Omdurman. It said one was shot in his head, and the other in his stomach. Elsewhere, security forces fired tear gas at protesters Saturday as they attempted to cross the Manshia Bridge over the Nile River to reach Khartoum's downtown, said Mohammed Yousef al-Mustafa, a spokesman for the Sudanese Professionals Association. "No power-sharing mediation with the military council again," he said. "They (the generals) have failed the transition and instated a coup."
Pro-democracy groups had called for protests across the country to press demands for re-instating a deposed transitional government and releasing senior political figures from detention. Since the military takeover, there have been daily street protests. At least nine people have been killed by security forces' gunfire, according to the doctors group and activists. At least 170 others have been injured, according to the UN. The US and the United Nations had warned Sudan's strongman, Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, that they view the military's treatment of the protesters as a test, and called for restraint.
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Gen. al-Burhan has claimed that the transition to democracy would continue despite the military takeover, saying he'd install a new technocrat government soon. The pro-democracy movement in Sudan, however, fears the military has no intention of easing its grip, and will appoint politicians it can control. Saturday's protests were likely to increase pressure on the generals who face mounting condemnations from the US and other Western countries to restore a civilian-led government. The demonstrations were called by the Sudanese Professionals Association and the so-called Resistance Committees. Both were at the forefront of an uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir and his Islamist government in 2019.
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