Answers: Sudan's Past and Present

Sudan is the third largest country in Africa (it was the largest until South Sudan broke away in 2011) and one of the poorest in the world, ranked 172 in the United Nations’ Human Development Report. Its history since independence from British-Egyptian control in 1956 has been riddled with coups and conflicts.

Omar Al Bashir led Sudan for nearly 30 years after seizing power in a coup in 1989. He was forced out in a coup in 2019 following mass protests sparked by soaring food and fuel prices. Another coup in 2021 toppled an uneasy civilian-military transitional government.

April 2023 began with the news that a planned agreement to set up a civilian-led transitional government had been postponed. A major sticking point was the integration of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) into the regular army. In two weeks, fighting started between the army led by Abdel Fattah Al Burhan and the RSF led by Mohamed Hamdan Daglo (better known as Hemedti)

Questions

1) The Rapid Support Forces has its roots in which militia accused of war crimes?

Janjaweed, the pro-government militia that has played a major role in the conflict in Darfur. More here and here. Hemedti, the head of the Rapid Support Forces is from Darfur and became an influential figure in the Janjaweed during the war that began in 2003. More here and here.

Some of the worst violence during the ongoing conflict has taken place in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state, bringing back memories of the Janjaweed. More here, here and here. The governor of the state was killed earlier this month, after he accused RSF fighters of killing civilians in large numbers.

2) Starting in 2015, Sudan sent tens of thousands of soldiers and fighters affiliated with the Rapid Support Forces to another country. Hundreds if not thousands of Sudanese have been killed in this conflict that now appears to be winding down. Where?

Yemen. More here, here and here. Sudan was part of the coalition led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates that launched a military operation against the Houthi rebels in 2015, after they seized the capital Sanaa. Talks have been held in recent months.

3) Which neighbouring country has seen the biggest influx of Sudanese refugees? It was already hosting hundreds of thousands of refugees from Darfur.

Chad. More here, here and here. You can read more about Chad’s strategic significance and its links with Darfur in the quiz on the country I published in 2021.

4) Al Fashaga, a fertile area on Sudan’s borders is at the heart of a boundary dispute with a neighbouring country that has its roots in a 1902 agreement shaped by colonial ruler Britain. A deal was reached in 2007 that allowed farmers from both countries to operate in the area. But in 2020 Sudanese troops seized large parts of Al Fashaga, expelling thousands of farmers from the other country (whose forces were occupied in a domestic conflict). Which country?

Ethiopia. More here, here and here. Shortly after the Ethiopian government launched its offensive on Tigray fighters in November 2020, Sudan’s army attacked the disputed border region, evicting Ethiopian farmers. You can read more about Ethiopia in the quiz I posted at the time.

5) This construction project started in 2011 was opposed by Egypt and Sudan. By January 2023 Sudan softened its stance. The project is now 90 percent complete but the conflict in Sudan has added an additional layer of uncertainty. Which project?

Ethiopia’s Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) project on the Blue Nile. More here, here and here. More on the implications of the conflict in Sudan for Ethiopia and Eritrea here.

6) This country’s government was criticised by its courts for not detaining Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir during his visit there for an African Union summit in 2015. It is a member of the International Criminal Court, which had issued an arrest warrant against Bashir for alleged war crimes in Darfur. In 2023 this country’s leadership has mooted leaving the ICC ahead of a likely visit by another world leader facing an arrest warrant. Name the country and the world leader now facing an ICC arrest warrant.

South Africa. More on Omar Al Bashir’s 2015 trip to South Africa here, here and here. This April South African president Cyril Ramaphosa said the governing African National Congress wanted the country to leave the ICC only to backtrack. South Africa is hosting the BRICS summit in August and has invited Russian president Vladimir Putin, who was issued an arrest warrant by the ICC in March over the deportation of children from Ukraine to Russia. More here, here and here.

7) In December 2018 Sudan’s Omar Al Bashir became the first Arab leader to visit which country for the first time since March 2011?

Syria. More here. Syria under Bashar Al Assad was readmitted into the Arab League in May 2023. More here and here.

8) In October 2020 Sudan agreed to work towards normalising ties with which country in a U.S.-brokered deal? In February 2023 this country’s foreign minister visited Sudan and announced that a peace agreement would be signed later this year. The ongoing conflict has thrown the timeline into question. Which country?

Israel. More here. More on the Israeli foreign minister’s February visit to Sudan here. More on the Israeli outlook on the ongoing conflict here and here.

Thousands of Jews from Ethiopia were clandestinely moved to Israel from refugee camps in Sudan amid the famine of 1984-85. More on the Mossad operation here.

9) What action known as Operation Infinite Reach was undertaken by the United States on August 20, 1998? It soon emerged that the U.S. had no evidence to back its claims.

U.S. missiles struck the Al Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum, two weeks after the Al Qaeda bombings targeting U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Osama bin Laden had lived in Sudan from 1991 to 1996. The U.S. claimed that the factory was linked to bin Laden and was producing chemical weapons, claims that were discredited soon. More here, here, here, here and here.

Al Shifa factory was the largest manufacturer of medicines in Sudan. A freeze on its owner Salah Idris’ U.S. assets was lifted in 1999 after he filed a lawsuit. But his compensation claims were rejected by U.S. courts.

10) Sudan exported this commodity for the first time in 1999. But it lost three quarters of the resource when South Sudan became independent in 2011. What?

Oil. More on the initial oil exports in 1999 here and here. Oil has been a major source of tension between Sudan and landlocked South Sudan, which relies heavily on Sudan’s Red Sea terminals to export its crude. More here, here and here.

Fighting has been reported in South Kordofan, which has Sudan's main oil fields.

11) Sudan’s last democratically elected prime minister Sadiq ——- who was deposed by the military coup led by Omar Al Bashir in 1989 was also the great grandson of an important 19th century figure. Who?

Sadiq Al Mahdi is the great grandson of Mohammad Ahmad Al Mahdi, who fought against Ottoman/Egyptian forces and defeated the British General Charles Gordon in 1885. More here, here and here. More on Sadiq Al Mahdi here, here, here and here. His daughter Mariam Al Mahdi was briefly foreign minister in the transitional government formed after the ouster of Omar Al Bashir. She resigned after the coup in October 2021.

12) Whose two-volume book The River War about the British colonial victory in the Battle of Omdurman was first published in 1899? (he had taken part in the battle)

Winston Churchill. More here and here.

13) What action taken by Sudan’s President Jaafar Nimeiri in 1983 precipitated civil war that eventually led to the formation of South Sudan in 2011? 1983 also saw the establishment of the Sudan's People's Liberation Movement (SPLM)

Sharia law was imposed. This along with the abolition of the Southern Sudan Autonomous Region accelerated southern separatism. More here and here.

14) Sudan has the largest number of which ancient structures in the world? (more than the country widely known for those structures)

Pyramids. More here, here, here and here.

I first heard about the pyramids in Sudan in the Al Jazeera report below from 2020.

15) About 70 percent of the global supply of a key ingredient for soft drink makers like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo come from Sudan. This product is also used by candy and cosmetic manufacturers among others and substitutes for this are hard to find. Which product? (it was exempted when the U.S. imposed sanctions against Sudan in the 1990s)

Gum arabic. More here, here and here. More on the exemption from U.S. sanctions given to gum arabic here.

16) Born in Sudan’s Darfur region around 1869, Josephine Bakhita was kidnapped and enslaved as a child. She was bought by an Italian diplomat in Sudan who took her back to Italy. A court ruling upheld her freedom. She lived the rest of her life in Schio, Italy and was known as Madre Moretta (the Black Mother). What status was conferred on her in the year 2000?

Sainthood by the Roman Catholic Church. More here and here. The church regards her as the patron saint of Sudan and human trafficking survivors. A popular radio station run by the church in South Sudan has the name Radio Bakhita.

17) An international Mixed Electoral Commission supervised Sudan’s first parliamentary elections in November 1953. Who headed the commission, a year after successfully shepherding the first post-independence national elections in his home country?

Sukumar Sen, India’s first Chief Election Commissioner who oversaw his country’s first general elections in 1951-52 after independence from Britain. More about Sen’s work in Sudan here and here.

18) Finally, a question linking Sudan and my home state Kerala. Abdul Ghani from Sudan was the first from Africa to take part in a sporting competition and his success opened the door for several players from African countries. Local fans captivated by Ghani referred to all African players as ‘Sudani’. Which competition?

Sevens football with seven players a side, which is popular in Kerala’s Malabar region. More on Abdul Ghani here in Malayalam.

The critically and commercially acclaimed Malayalam film Sudani from Nigeria (2018) featured a Nigerian refugee footballer who excels in Sevens. More here, here and here.