A total of 40 military officers were apprehended in Sudan on Tuesday after they attempted to overthrow the country's transitional administration.
According to CNN, the officers attempted to seize control of Sudan's state television station as well as the country's biggest military post in the capital. The officers had backed former president Omar al-Bashir, who was deposed in 2019 and is currently imprisoned on corruption charges, according to a government spokesman in a statement released on Monday.
Following his release from a Sudanese prison, Bashir will be brought before the International Criminal Court (ICC) on charges of genocide. During the 2004 Darfur genocide in which the Sudanese army and government-backed militias killed as many as 200,000 ethnic minorities, the Sudanese transitional government agreed to hand Bashir over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for trial.
as well as military officers within the Sudanese Armed Forces.
He added that all members of the coup leadership, civilian and military, have been detained.
Minister Al Amir further stated that the attempt was being monitored by security forces for some time.
— Awad Mustafa (@awadz) September 21, 2021
“There has been a failed coup attempt by military officers remnants of the former regime, we are confirming as the transitional council that we are coordinating fully and we are comforting the Sudanese people that the situation is completely under control,” the spokesman, Hamza Baloul, said, according to CNN.
“We’re not going back… there are people trying to turn back the hands of time,” he continued.
Abdalla Hamdok, the Prime Minister of Sudan, is in charge of the country's transitional government at the moment. President Hamdok and other top government officials have expressed their desire to hold parliamentary elections, which are tentatively scheduled to take place in 2022. Since the overthrow of Bashir, the country has been hit by economic shocks and widespread food insecurity.
Sudan has had to deal with military coups on a number of occasions. Bashir came to power in a 1989 coup against Prime Minister Sadiq al-Mahdi. Following a coup in 1985, Al-Mahdi was elected to the position of prime minister in 1986.
