UN Human Rights Commissioner: Sudan Protests ‘Unprecedented’

Sunday’s mass protests across Sudan were “unprecedented in recent Sudanese history,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a statement on Wednesday. The tens of thousands of protesters were met with violence by authorities. Seven people were killed and over 180 wounded, the Sudan News Agency reported. “This recipe of restrictions, unmet promises and bouts of unbridled violence which are neither investigated nor punished is stoking massive resentment – as Sunday’s protests showed all too clearly,” she said in the statement. “If things continue like this, it will be a recipe for disaster.” Sudanese protesters and senior army officers have been at loggerheads ever since the overthrow of president Omar Al-Bashir on April 11. Opposition groups have since been pressuring the current military rulers to transfer power to civilians, but talks collapsed after raid on a sit-in site on June 3 that left as many as 130 dead. On Tuesday, an Ethiopian mediator urged both sides to hold direct talks to strike a deal on handing over power to civilians.