Kenyan President William Ruto’s decision to send troops on a peacekeeping mission in conflict-ravaged Sudan without an international mandate was a diplomatic blunder, according to Egyptian political analyst Said Sadek.
Speaking to RT on Tuesday, Sadek said both the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF) are confident of victory in the fighting that has raged since mid-April.
“As long as nobody in the warzone stops believing that they will win the war,” there is no possibility of a successful peacekeeping mission, he said.
Sadek was reacting to a Kenyan-led proposal for East African troops to assist in ending the fighting in Khartoum, which was rejected amid threats from Sudanese army officials.
Earlier this month, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, of which Kenya is a member, proposed deploying peacekeepers in neighboring Sudan.
Sudan’s army has repeatedly opposed the Kenyan-led initiative, claiming that Nairobi supports the rival RSF. It has stated that any foreign troops would be considered enemy forces.
On Sunday, Yasir Alatta, the SAF’s assistant commander-in-chief, dared Ruto to send troops to Sudan and face the consequences of doing so.
Sadek argued that, despite Kenya’s long history of peacekeeping operations in South Sudan and Darfur, the country erred by authorizing the deployment of troops to Sudan without an international mandate.
“I think it was a miscalculation of the Kenyan president… If you want to send peacekeeping forces to a conflict-ridden area you must get approval on the ground by the fighting forces,” he insisted.
Sudanese journalist Musab Ibrahim called the move a "very risky" mission that could strain Nairobi’s ties with Khartoum.
Kenya should have studied the conflict and known what solutions were workable because a peacekeeping operation in Sudan is “impossible” due to the lack of an official government, Ibrahim told RT.
The Sudanese health ministry says the violence has killed more than 3,000 people. There have been multiple international mediation offers, but none have succeeded in achieving a complete ceasefire.