Egyptian officials said that Cairo is intensifying consultations with concerned regional and international partners this week in order to work out a scheme that could bring “long-term stability to Sudan” on the basis of power-sharing “among political players”.
“The situation in Sudan is alarming at many levels, especially at the humanitarian level with the continued siege around Al-Obaid and the increasing attempts of the militias to create a de facto on-the-ground separation,” an official said.
“This situation is not sustainable both in the interests of the Sudanese and the unity of Sudan and also in the interests of regional stability in East Africa,” he added.
A key city in south-central Sudan, Al-Obaid, has been under siege for weeks by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a militia that has been militarily confronting the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) since April 2023 after what had previously been solid cooperation between the two sides.
Al-Obaid was one of the cities that the RSF imposed a siege on in the early phase of the war in April 2023. In the early months of 2025, the SAF managed to break the siege but only for a few months before the RSF re-imposed it.
During the past few weeks, the RSF has escalated its drone attacks on the city, targeting both military and civilian facilities.
UN bodies and key humanitarian organisations have been warning over the past few days that the city is looking atrocities in the eye. “We are well aware that the RSF has been receiving military support from across the borders with Libya and Chad,” said a second official.
“We are sharing our concerns with both Tripoli and N’djamena, and we are hoping that they will both act to put a cap on the inflow of mercenaries and arms.”
But he said that due to internal issues of stability in both countries, it is not an easy task for either Libya or Chad to impose watertight screening on the borders with Sudan. “We understand the complexity of the situation, and we are offering whatever help either country might need,” he said.
According to the officials who spoke to Al-Ahram Weekly, Cairo is not launching a new initiative on Sudan.
It is, however, pushing for a scheme that should ensure the end of the siege of Al-Obaid, open humanitarian corridors to allow aid to get through, secure the suspension of military confrontations, and explore a political deal among those political players who are willing to work on the basis of keeping the territorial integrity of Sudan under one government and with a single national army.
“This is not something that will happen in weeks or months, and given the complexity of the situation in Sudan and the fact that there are many foreign players in the country, this is a task that requires collaborative efforts and firm UN support,” the first official said.
He added that Egypt is working closely with Saudi Arabia, the UK, and the US to secure a clear UN Security Council position that would prohibit any support for militias in Sudan. “We are not there yet, but we are getting the message across,” he said.
Earlier this week, Ihab Awad, Egypt’s permanent representative to the UN in New York, warned that Sudan is facing threats of partition and called on the UN Security Council to act firmly to prohibit this scenario.
Awad addressed a special UN Security Council session on Sudan that convened at UN headquarters on 26 June.
“This is not exaggeration. There are countries in the region, including Israel and [others], that are working to get Sudan to split roughly into an eastern country and a western country. They are not thinking that this will be done tomorrow, but this is their plan and we are working firmly against it,” the second official said.
In press statements made this week, Yasser Al-Atta, the SAF chief of staff, accused Israel of supporting the RSF with the intention of compromising Sudan’s territorial unity. Al-Atta said the SAF would continue its efforts to gain control of the entire country and expel the RSF.
Al-Atta spoke a few days after Abdel-Fattah Al-Burhan, chief of the SAF, said that he was not open to any political arrangement that did not entail the dismantling of the RSF.
According to a Cairo-based Sudanese source close to the SAF leadership, “there was a moment after the beginning of the war when Al-Burhan was open to the integration of some elements of the RSF in the national army, but this is no longer the case.”
“The past three years have made it clear that there is no meeting point between the two sides,” he said.
Egyptian officials said that what Cairo is working on is a political compromise that will ensure the rule of the SAF. In his statements this week, Awad said that there can be no solution for Sudan that equates the national army with a militia.
“We have tried to engage the RSF in a political process, but its attitude is not in favour of political engagement,” the first source said.
According to the second official, there has been a trend among leading RSF members to defect from the militia, with these defectors pursuing dialogue with the SAF. “The war is between the SAF and the RSF, but the political spectrum in Sudan is much wider than that, and there are multiple ideas on how to create a space for dialogue for all those who wish to engage in a political process,” he stated.
Egypt has been in close coordination with Saudi Arabia on the facilitation of a political dialogue in Sudan. Both Egypt and Saudi Arabia are members of the Sudan Quad group along with the US and the UAE.
Egyptian officials say that the Egyptian-Saudi views on Sudan are much closer than those of the other Quad members. However, they add that Egypt is keeping channels of communication open with all the parties concerned both at the regional and the international level.
They stressed that Egypt has been helping to facilitate a more constructive dialogue between Washington and the SAF to avoid misunderstandings.
This week saw a diplomatic dispute between the US and Sudan at the UN Security Council session on the crisis in the country, with Massad Boulos, a senior US advisor, saying that Al-Burhan as head of the Transitional Sovereignty Council had declined the most recent amended version of an American proposal for a humanitarian truce in Sudan and Sudan’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Al-Harith Idris, saying that the council had demanded amendments but had not declined it.
According to the Cairo-based Sudanese source, “the trouble with the American proposal is that it is dealing with the army and the RSF as two equal sides, and this is not acceptable for the majority of the Sudanese people and certainly not for the SAF.”
Egyptian officials said that they are currently trying to help establish stable lines of communication between the US administration and the Sovereignty Council to help overcome differences and misunderstandings.
For now, they stressed, the target is to spare Al-Obaid from a humanitarian disaster similar to the one that unfolded in Al-Fasher late last year after its takeover by the RSF following an 18-month siege.
According to UN reports, in Al-Fasher “the RSF carried out ethnically targeted killings, widespread sexual violence, and forced disappearances.” A UN fact-finding mission earlier this year spoke of the “hallmarks of genocide” committed by the RSF against tribes in the area.
This week, UN officials said that Al-Obaid cannot sustain the current siege for more than a few weeks and a maximum of two months. In a joint statement issued late last week, Britain, France, Italy, Ireland, Germany, Holland, and Norway said that the RSF must end its siege of Al-Obaid and halt all attacks on the city.
Earlier this week, Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty called his Sudanese counterpart Mohieddin Salem to consult over developments. According to a press statement issued by the press office of the top Egyptian diplomat, Abdelatty assured Salem of Egypt’s commitment to Sudan’s unity.
“There is a serious risk of the division of Sudan, and this risk has become very clear during the past few months,” said an informed European source.
“Egypt is clearly opposed to this scenario, and it has certainly been working hard to lobby support against the transfer of the current de facto split to a de jure reality,” he stated.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 2 July, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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