Sudan's head of the military, Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, speaks during a press conference in Khartoum, Oct. 26, 2021. (AP)

Sudan’s junta led by General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan has turned down an IGAD invitation to attend the latest peace talks with a rival paramilitary faction Rapid Support Force in Uganda this week.

The Intergovernmental Authority on Development had scheduled an extraordinary meeting on Thursday, January 18 to discuss ending the deadly war that erupted on April 15, 2023.

A similar invitation was also extended to the rebel faction RSF, whose leader, General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo recently toured the region and Africa in what analysts believe is a bid for international legitimacy.

The RSF has reportedly accepted the invite, while Sudan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs accused the bloc of engineering a “shameful precedent”.

“The invitation of the IGAD Secretariat to the leader of the Janjaweed militia to attend the emergency summit of IGAD No 42 is a flagrant violation of the agreement establishing IGAD and all the rules and traditions of the work of international organizations,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

The junta said the invitation of General Dagalo is a “gross disregard for the victims of genocide, ethnic cleansing, sexual violence and all the atrocities practiced by Janjaweed gangs” in different parts of the country.

“Not only did IGAD remain silent as graves over the atrocities of the terrorist militia, which were condemned by international organizations such as the UN, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, EU, League of Arab States, International Conference on the Great Lakes Region, and some countries led by the US, but it also sought to grant the militia legitimacy by calling for a meeting.”

“This shameful precedent will not only destroy the credibility of IGAD as a regional bloc because it does not respect its documents and basic systems and works to undermine the sovereignty of member states, but it also represents sponsorship of terrorism, genocide, and ethnic cleansing, and encouragement for the groups that commit the atrocities that the region is suffering from.”

The junta further accused the regional bloc of “repudiating its basic system and the requirements of international law and accepting it to be a tool for conspiring against Sudan and its people.”

But it maintained that the country remains open to suggestions on ending the conflict.

General Burhan, the Commander-in-Chief of the Sudan Armed Forces, and General Dagalo of the Rapid Support Force plunged their country into a deadly conflict that has now taken eight months.

According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project and Sudan’s Health Ministry, at least 12,260 people have been killed since April 15 in the conflict in Sudan.

The United States has determined that warring factions in Sudan have committed war crimes, as it increases pressure on both sides to end fighting which has caused a humanitarian crisis.