Dozens of students injured, held in Sudan’s El Gezira Aba

Dozens were injured on Sunday in clashes between protesting students and militant student members of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) at the Imam El Mahdi University in central Sudan’s El Gezira Aba.

The fighting erupted in the morning, after students of the Faculty of Arts prepared to stage a protest against the university administration’s dismissal of one of their colleagues.

One of the protesters told Radio Dabanga that the administration expelled Abdelhalim Mohamedein last week without providing a reason. “This sparked our anger, and we decided to organise a discussion forum on Sunday in which we would demand the return of our colleague or the dismissal of all the faculty students.”

He said that the militant NCP students attacked the attendants of the forum with metal bars and batons. “At least 15 students sustained injuries, some of them serious.”

Security forces intervened and detained an as yet unknown number of students.

Student leaders Abdelhalim Mohamedein and Ahmed Ibrahim had organised a sit-in at the campus on 13 November, demanding the improvement of the study environment and the activation of the University’s students’ union. Security forces broke up the peaceful protest with batons and tear gas.

Two days later Mohamedein and Ibrahim were summonsed to appear before a Commission of Inquiry of the University.