Sudan: seven dead in new tribal clashes in Blue Nile

Seven Sudanese have been killed in fresh tribal clashes in Sudan's Blue Nile state, despite a truce reached after similar bloody fighting in late July, the official Suna agency reported Friday.

After a week of shooting and burning that left 105 people dead in late July, the Hausa and Barta African tribes had agreed to a ceasefire and promised to renegotiate a lasting peace in this region of southeastern Sudan, bordering Ethiopia.

However, "tribal clashes resumed on Thursday" and "seven people were killed and 23 wounded", notably in al-Roseires, where rival tribes had set fire to each other's shops in July, the Sudanese agency Suna reported, without specifying whether the dead were civilians or fighters.

Mohammed Mokhtar, a resident, told AFP "shooting and house burning have been taking place since (Friday) morning" not far from al-Roseires.

The conflict between these two tribes has arisen from the very sensitive issue of access to land in a country, where agriculture and livestock account for 43% of jobs and 30% of GDP.

Ancestral custom prohibits the Hausa, who were the last to arrive on the Blue Nile, from owning land, which they dispute.

Their clashes forced 31,000 people to move, many of whom are still living in makeshift camps or schools.

Tribal conflicts have claimed hundreds of lives in recent months in Darfur, a region in western Sudan bordering Chad, in part, experts say, because of the security vacuum created by the October 25, 2021 putsch in Khartoum.