Imams in Khartoum condemn Sudan regime’s violence at protests

In their Friday sermons, a number of imams in various mosques in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum launched fierce attacks on the government and the security forces, condemning the killing of demonstrators.

In particular, the statements of former Vice President Ali Osman Taha and leading member of the ruling National Congress Party, El Fateh Izzeldin, saying demonstrators should be killed, have sparked a wide range of reactions among the clerics.

Dr Adam El Shein, Imam of El Rahma Mosque in El Haj Yousef in Khartoum North considers the statements of Taha and Izzeldin as “an attack on the social fabric of the country by calling on the people to kill each other.

“He who shoots bullets is a murderer, aims his gun at demonstrators is a murderer, whoever supports them is a murderer, and those who are ordering them to do so are even more evil,” he said.

El Shein stressed that the killing and detentions will not dissuade the protesters from demanding their rights. He called on the government to enter negotiations with the demonstrators and their leaders and not to listen to the talk of what he described as “drummers and beneficiaries”.

‘Woe to killers of innocent souls’

The imam of El Sahafa Shereg Mosque, Mohamed Amin Ismail, reminded the security forces and the government of “the sanctity of blood” and “the promised woe to killers of innocent souls in the hereafter”, referring to Koran verses and Hadiths about bloodshed.

The imam of El Manshiyya Mosque in eastern Khartoum, El Migdad El Hajan, said that “people saw with their own eyes who is the real aggressor, who is confronting peaceful actions with violence, and heard who is calling for bloodshed”.

He praised the demonstrators, saying that “these young men and women are facing arms openly. This happened only once before, during El Mahdiya (the 1881 revolt of the Sudanese against Anglo-Egyptian occupation).

The Imam of the El Riyadh Mosque in eastern Khartoum, Sheikh Nasir Khattab likened the statement of Al Bashir in El Gezira state on Tuesday, in which the president described the protestors as “rumour-mongers, traitors, and foreign agents”, to the speech of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in his last days.

Al Bashir is facing increased pressure from within Muslim circles. On December 28, Al Bashir was whisked away from the Sayida Sanhouri Mosque in Khartoum after worshippers began to chant slogans calling for him to step down.