صورة لفوج متمردي "العدل والمساواة" في طريقهم الى مصيرهم المحتوم!

Quote: Khartoum says Darfur rebel attack on capital 'failed' 2 hours ago KHARTOUM (AFP) — Sudanese authorities said on Saturday that the army had repulsed an unprecedented attack on the capital Khartoum by Darfur rebels following heavy clashes and the imposition of an emergency curfew. "The operation is a failure," senior NCP member Kamal Obeid told AFP after troops clashed with Islamist rebels across the river from Khartoum in its twin city of Omdurman, where witnesses had reported heavy fighting. "The Justice and Equality Movement attempted to destabilise security but Sudanese forces opposed them," Obeid said, accusing neighbouring Chad of being behind the attack. "The attempt by (Chadian) President Idriss Deby to destabilise Sudan has failed," Obeid said. Khartoum and Ndjamena accuse each other of backing rebels seeking to topple their respective regimes. Chad denied the charge. "The government denies all involvement in this adventure which it condemns unreservedly, regardless of who was responsible," government spokesman Mahamat Hissene said in a statement from the Chad capital Ndjamena. Sudan state television showed images of what it said were captured rebels cowering in the back of an armoured personnel carrier, along with footage of captured rebel all-terrain vehicles, field artillery and shells. Earlier the army said that its troops were under rebel attack in Omdurman, which lies to the northwest of Khartoum across a strategic Nile bridge. "Army forces are currently facing attack by rebels loyal to (JEM leader) Khalil Ibrahim in the north of Omdurman," the military said in a statement. The JEM said earlier that its fighters had taken control of Wadi Saidna air force base about 10 miles (16 kilometres) north of Khartoum and were headed into the capital. Witnesses said there was heavy fighting in Omdurman for at least two hours. The White House said it was "very concerned" about the violence and urged both the Darfur rebels and government forces to cease hostilities. Omdurman resident Sadiq Babo Nimr told AFP by telephone that frightened residents were hunkered down at home amid heavy artillery fire. "It's just outside my flat, I can hear bombardment from very heavy artillery," he said. "We're just lying down, there are stray bullets around the building, my wife and children are very scared." He said he heard distant gunfire and the fighting drew closer at around 4:30 pm (1330 GMT). He said there was no electricity and mobile phone networks were down. A curfew was imposed in the capital from 1400 GMT on Saturday until 0700 GMT on Sunday, the interior ministry said, urging residents to say indoors. It was not immediately known if there were any casualties in the fighting. London-based JEM spokesman Ahmed Hussein Adam told AFP by telephone the fighters wanted to topple the Khartoum regime. "We don't want this suicidal regime to remain in power and to kill and massacre our people every day," Adam said. State media said the Sudanese army had repulsed an attack by Chadian forces on the border in the Kishkish area, with an army spokesman calling the Chad raid a bid to create a diversion from JEM's advance on Khartoum. "Our armed forces stood up to the Chadian forces, inflicted casualties on them and drove them back into the Chadian territories," Brigadier Mohammed Osman al-Aghbash told Omdurman Radio. He accused the Chadian government of providing "direct support" to JEM's "subversive operation" in Khartoum. A Western diplomat who requested anonymity said that Sudan had on Friday warned embassies of the rebel advance. "There are rebels that have been moving eastwards from the Chadian border," one diplomat quoted the authorities as saying. Extra security forces began deploying on Khartoum's streets on Friday, the Sudanese authorities said. JEM are "trying to prove a point. I don't think anyone expects at this stage to see heavy fighting in the streets. I think they're going to be crushed but the simple fact that they got to Omdurman is huge," the diplomat said. JEM has carried out a number of high-profile attacks in Sudan, including raids on Chinese-run oil fields, criticising what it calls Beijing's refusal to rein in Khartoum's alleged human rights abuses. US Darfur expert and activist Eric Reeves described Saturday's fighting as potentially "an extraordinary development." JEM was involved for years with another rebellion in eastern Sudan by the disenfranchised Beja and Rashaida people, although the Eastern Front rebel alliance signed a peace deal with Khartoum in 2006. The group emerged militarily as the most powerful movement in Darfur, where rebel groups have fractured into myriad organisations during the past five years, and JEM has always promoted national objectives. More than two million people have fled their homes in the western Sudanese region of Darfur since the Khartoum government enlisted militia allies to put down a revolt in the region in 2003. UN humanitarian chief John Holmes said last month that the death toll in Darfur from five years of war, famine and disease might have reached 300,000. Khartoum says the toll is around 9,000.