Sudan’s War and the New Regional Order in the Horn of Africa and the Middle East

• In Event: Armed Group Agency during Civil Wars

Abstract

On April 15, 2023, Sudan witnessed the onset of an unprecedent civil conflict that has not only undermined the country’s struggle towards a transition to democracy; it threatens to destabilize the Sahel, the Horn of Africa, and the Red Sea region. The current war in Sudan, characterized by a violent political rivalry between a powerful insurgent militia and an Islamist-backed National Army is threatening the very foundation of the modern Sudanese state. The war in Sudan is further exacerbated by profound changes in geostrategic regional realignments in the Horn of Africa as well as in the Middle East and Red Sea corridor which is increasingly transforming the conflict into yet another proxy war in the region fueled by competition among external actors. This paper examines the underlying causes and consequences of the war in Sudan, the key political and economic factors that led up to and characterize the conflict, and the prospects for conflict resolution and peace building in the context of the wide-scale humanitarian crisis. In addressing the roots and dynamics of Sudan’s war, the paper pays special attention to the ways in which local armed actors are both constrained and supported by external actors in the course of the war; how the two principal armed protagonists have embarked on re-framing their discourse and interests in ways designed to forge alliances with key regional powers; and, most significantly, how recent shifts in regional alignments in the broader region have directly influenced the character as well as the trajectory of the war. Ultimately, the analysis takes as its point of analytical departure the proposition that changes in the strategic objectives and discursive framing on the part of armed actors in Sudan’s war is rooted in agency-driven (rather than purely structurally grounded) processes of negotiation, and instrumentalization evolving under the exigencies of new strategic re-alignments that have far reaching political consequences for Sudan as well as the Sahel, the Middle East, the Horn, and the Red Sea region.

Author

• Khalid Medani, McGill University