US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken says the ceasefire came after two days of intense negotiations and was due to start on Tuesday.
The US has said Sudan’s warring factions agreed to a 72-hour ceasefire as Western, Arab and Asian countries rushed to remove their citizens from the country.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said on Monday that the ceasefire follows two days of intense negotiations and would begin on Tuesday. The two sides have breached several temporary ceasefire agreements over the past week.
On April 15, fighting broke out between the Sudanese armed forces and the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF), killing at least 427 people, knocking out hospitals and other services, and turning residential areas into war zones.
“During this period, the United States is urging the SAF (Sudan Armed Forces) and RSF to immediately and fully enforce the ceasefire. To support a lasting end to the fighting, the United States will work with regional and international partners and Sudanese civilian stakeholders,” Blinken said in a statement.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the violence in a country flanking the Red Sea, the Horn of Africa and the Sahel “risks a catastrophic conflagration … which could engulf the entire region and beyond”.
He urged the 15 members of the UN Security Council to use their power to return Sudan to the path of democratic transition after a 2021 military coup that followed the fall of longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir in a popular uprising.
“We must all do everything in our power to pull Sudan back from the brink of collapse… We stand with them at this terrible time,” Guterres said, adding that he had authorized the temporary move of a number of UN personnel and families.
The Security Council has scheduled a meeting on Sudan on Tuesday.
Flurry of evacuation missions
Tens of thousands of people, including Sudanese and citizens from neighboring countries, have fled in recent days, including to Egypt, Chad and South Sudan, despite instability and difficult living conditions.
At least two convoys involved in evacuations came under fire this weekend. Diplomats have been targeted and at least five aid workers have been killed.
The fighting calmed down enough over the weekend for the US and UK to fire embassy staff, prompting a wave of evacuations of hundreds of foreigners through countries ranging from Gulf Arab states to Russia, Japan and South Korea.
South Africa said Monday it has begun evacuating dozens of civilians. State Department spokesman Clayson Monyela told the press: “They are being taken to a neighboring country for safety”.
Paris said it had evacuated 491 people, including 196 French citizens and others of 36 other nationalities. A French warship was on its way to Port Sudan to pick up more evacuees.
Four German air force planes had evacuated more than 400 people of different nationalities from Sudan as of Monday.
Several countries sent military jets from Djibouti to fly people out of Khartoum, including to Port Sudan, where some have boarded ships bound for Saudi Arabia.
Families with children crowded into Spanish and French military transport planes, while a group of nuns were among the evacuees on an Italian plane, photos showed.
Scarce food, electricity, water
For those left behind in Africa’s third-largest country, where a third of its population of 46 million people already needed help before the violence, the situation grew increasingly bleak.
There is an acute shortage of food, clean water, medicines and fuel and limited access to communications and electricity, with prices skyrocketing, UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said.
He cited further reports of looting of humanitarian supplies and warehouses, saying “intense fighting” in Khartoum and Darfur, as well as in Blue Nile, North Kordofan and northern states, hampered relief operations.