The workplace in Port Sudan has no distinguishing functions.
No sign on the outside, no sign of whats going on inside.Young males, relatively belonging to abundant, upper-middle class households, wearing modern clothing can be discovered within.They are university graduates with shaved faces.
They are part of a hardline militant group lined up with Sudans Islamic motion and accused of being a front for the return of an ideology that thrived under the autocrat Omar al-Bashir, who ruled Sudan from 1989 to 2019, when he was lastly eliminated following a democratic revolution.In Port Sudan, which serves as an alternative capital for the federal government lined up to the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), Middle East Eye met with members of the al-Bara ibn Malik brigade, which has been combating along with the army.
The SAF has actually been at war with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) since April 2023.
From this office and others in Sudanese cities managed by the army the group is dealing with hiring youths to join it, organizing their movement and transport to battlegrounds, and collaborating with the armys special assistance forces.The members insisted they were working under the SAFs command and that they had no way of providing or funding themselves outside of the army and their own pockets.They likewise worried that they would be institutionally dismantled after the end of the war, emphasizing that they have no aspirations to seize power after defeating the RSF.Re-emergence Named after an early Muslim fighter and companion of the Prophet, al-Bara ibn Malik brigade was established as part of the Popular Defence Forces (PDF), an Islamist paramilitary group that fought for Bashirs Sudanese state against the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army (SPLA) led by John Garang.The PDF was taken apart after the uprising that eliminated Bashir in 2019, but this proved short-lived: in 2023 it returned.Just before the war broke out in April of that year, some members of al-Bara ibn Malik re-emerged in Khartoum, arranging Ramadan breakfasts and making rally speeches versus the framework agreement then being surged out between the army, the RSF and the civilian Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) coalition.The structure deal was one of the causes of the war, and al-Bara ibn Maliks existence and impact proliferated after it broke out, especially when army primary Abdel Fattah al-Burhan opened military training camps in the summer season of 2023 for anyone who wanted to offer to combat against the RSF.
In a special interview, al-Bara ibn Malik spokesman Amar Abdul Wahab Sid Ahmed stated the variety of army-aligned fighters in groups like his, which he described as jihadi, is now above 20,000.
Considering that the very first days of the war in Khartoum, youth from different political backgrounds have actually gone to the camps of the SAF to get basic training in order to fight against the RSF and protect themselves and households, Sid Ahmed said.The exact same thing happened in the states of al-Jazira and in other places, which saw extraordinary atrocities including mass killing, the rape of women, robbery of residential or commercial properties and imposed displacement, the spokesperson told MEE.According to Sid Ahmed, the group is expanding every day.
Its fighters, called al-Baraoon in Arabic, vow to combat what they refer to as the Emirati intrusion of Sudan, describing the support the UAE supplies the RSF, which has actually been documented by Middle East Eye.The Al-Bara ibn Malik brigade has become very famous during the war, with numerous videos of the young jihadis battling with the army against the RSF appearing on social media.The groups growing impact, its independent operations, slogans, banners, tradition, recruitment and other methods have actually seen it end up being controversial.Last April, a drone strike on a Ramadan iftar being held by the group left 15 dead, while a couple of months later on, in June, its leader Al-Misbah Abuzeid Talha was apprehended in Saudi Arabia after he held a number of meetings with a variety of Islamists inside the kingdom, according to a diplomatic source who spoke to Ayin.Al-Bara ibn Maliks fighters have actually ended up being famous for their hallmark forefinger sign, which they stated shows their orientation as an Islamic group, something that draws criticism from big swathes of civic society, which accuse the group of adopting the ideas of extremists.This has been a problem for Burhan, who has privately confessed that the groups prominent social media existence and openly proclaimed jihadi identity has cost the army support from some worldwide countries.The leaders of the al-Bara ibn Malik, which state their group is more jihadist than politically Islamic, have actually also appeared in intensive clashes on the wars frontlines in the capital Khartoum, al-Jazira, Sennar, White Nile states and other areas.Its clear that the militia [RSF] is completely collapsing and its only a matter of time before its remaining pockets of control are ended, Sid Ahmed said.The army has actually made considerable gains recently in central and southern Sudan, as well as in Khartoum and its environments, though the RSF continues to control nearly all of Darfur.What we are seeing on the ground is full victory very soon, Sid Ahmed stated.
We are cleaning up the capital Khartoum and likewise other states.AtrocitiesThe Al-Bara ibn Malik brigade has been extensively and often credibly implicated of devoting horrible atrocities, including the indiscriminate massacre of civilians and RSF soldiers.Sid Ahmed rejected these charges.
Al-Bara ibn Malik forces have no mandate or power to apprehend or apprehend anyone, the group spokesman said.We have absolutely nothing to do with the infractions.
Moreover, we are working as guerrilla forces and all these accusations about the involvement of al-Baraoon in offenses here or there are simply lies and propaganda spread out by the RSF and its allies.He said the group was conducting unique operations protecting civilians - MEE saw videos of one recording an evacuation of civilians north of Khartoum - and liberating detainees of war, which the reports spread against them came from the RSF and Tagadum, the civilian group that has just recently splintered over whether to support the paramilitary or not.On January 31, however, the UN released a news release in which it revealed its deep alarm at summary executions of civilians presumably by fighters and militia allied to the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) in Khartoum North.
The militia was the al-Bara ibn Malik brigade.We are part of the SAF and are working under the complete command of SAF and its laws and policies, Sid Ahmed informed MEE.So, when we jail somebody who worked together with the militia, we hand him over to military intelligence with no violence versus civilians.The spokesperson noted the large coalition fighting together with the army, including groups associated with Sudans revolutionary movement, like Anger Without Borders.For us in al-Bara ibn Malik, we are usually not representing a specific political group or have a specific political affiliation, we have just one problem, one goal and one opponent so, we are combating just to accomplish these objectives and we have absolutely nothing to do with politics, Sid Ahmed stated, referring to the defeat of the RSF.We are not representing the National Congress Party (NCP) or any other political group, he continued, referring to Bashirs celebration.
We originate from a different background, various professions and we have just the objective that I informed you about and we are likewise working on humanitarian and civilian jobs to help our people, the representative said.When we complete our objective, this group will be deactivated and demobilized and those who separately want to continue with the army or any other routine forces like the intelligence, cops or others its totally approximately him.We are fully working under the command of the SAF, Sid Ahmed said.
Our only focus is to beat the RSF.Mohammed Amin is a Sudanese reporter specializing in geopolitics and human rights abuses in Sudan and South Sudan, as well as somewhere else in northeast Africa.
He works for numerous regional and worldwide media outlets.
In November 2022, the Rory Peck Trust awarded him the Martin Adler Prize for his work for Middle East Eye, in which he covered Wagner Group massacres and the Sudanese coup.Source: Middle East Eye