Sudan: Leaders of Al-Bashir's party escape from prison

Ahmed Haroun, a former Sudanese official in Omar Al-Bashir’s regime, said that he escaped Kober Prison with other former officials and stated that they would be responsible for their own protection.

Haroun, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), added in an audio statement aired on Sudan’s Tayba TV channel yesterday, that he and other former officials are ready to appear before the judiciary when it is functioning.

The statement follows reports that inmates at Kober Prison escaped earlier this week. Al-Bashir and his senior deputies were among those held in the prison.

It was not immediately clear if Al-Bashir, who has repeatedly been moved to a military hospital, was in the prison.

The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) accused the Sudanese army leaders of igniting the war as a cover to get the leaders of the former regime out of prison.

The forces added in a statement on Twitter early this morning: “Everyone witnessed, from day one of the battles that broke out between the Rapid Support Forces and the coup leaders of the Armed Forces, that the Rapid Support Forces chose to stand by the masses of our people against the forces of treachery represented by the coup leaders who drew plans and scenarios to ignite the war as a cover to create security justifications to release the leaders of the former regime from prison to continue their extremist terrorist project by returning to power again.”

“We warned since the first day of the outbreak of the war and confirmed with conclusive evidence that the leadership of the coup forces has returned to the embrace of its extremist organisation, and has hijacked the decision of the armed forces and those around it to serve its dark agenda,” the statement continued.

“Our nation is too smart to be fooled by such exposed misleading steps that aim to restore their ousted regime,” the RSF added.

The statement ended by saying, “The masses of our honourable people have now begun a new revolution led by the brave Rapid Support Forces to complete the glorious December revolution in order to uproot the regime of sedition and rid the Sudanese people of the grip of the regime of oppression, extremism and terrorism forever.”

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