Cash, Troop and Ammo-Strapped Ukraine Finds Time for ‘Anti-Russia’ Proxy War in Africa
17:30 GMT 06.03.2024 (Updated: 18:31 GMT 06.03.2024)
© AP Photo / Marwan Ali
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NATO’s military and economic aid to Ukraine plummeted over the first two months of 2024 after the Pentagon doled out its final disbursement in December and Congress held up $61 billion in additional assistance. Washington has urged the Europeans to step up their own support, but commitments far amount to less than $10 billion.
While criticizing the West for its failure to meet Kiev’s insatiable appetite for weapons and dubbing the proxy war with Russia an existential fight for survival, Volodymyr Zelensky’s Ukraine has allegedly found the time and resources to ship elite troops off to a conflict zone more than 3,000 km away.
Ukrainian and Sudanese officials speaking to the Wall Street Journal said that Kiev sent special forces troops to Sudan in 2023 to take part in the fierce conflict between the Sudanese military and Rapid Support Forces paramilitaries, purportedly backed by a Russian PMC.
According to the report, de facto Sudanese leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan turned to Zelensky for help after finding himself surrounded by rebel forces in Khartoum, with Zelensky agreeing because Sudan had allegedly supplied weapons to Kiev in 2022, with the arms paid for by Ukraine’s Western patrons.
A Ukrainian commando said to have deployed in Sudan said Kiev’s operations were part of a global mission against Russia. “If they have gold mines in Sudan, we need to make them not profitable,” the trooper said.
The strategy aimed at “undermining Russia’s military and economic operations abroad” was reported to be ongoing, with WSJ indicating that it “comes with significant political risk at a moment when Western support for Ukraine is wavering.”
In December 2023, USAID administrator Samatha Power emphasized that “cutting off external support” for both sides in the Sudanese crisis was “essential to ending the violence,” and warned that “any individual or country that continues to provide material support to either side bears responsibility for fueling atrocities against the Sudanese people.”
Apparently, this sentiment includes an exemption for Kiev, with Ukrainian military Main Intelligence Directorate chief Kyrylo Budanov* hinting strongly about Kiev’s involvement in the intra-Sudanese conflict. “War is a risky business. We are in a full-fledged war with Russia…They have units in different parts of the world, and we sometimes try to strike them there,” Budanov said.
WSJ isn’t the first outlet to mention the use of Ukrainian special forces in Sudan, with the Kiev Post publishing footage late last year of Ukrainian units' suspected operations in the country.
4 February, 20:44 GMT
In late February, an analysis in The New Arab suggested that Kiev’s operations could be aimed at trying to disperse Russian forces and signaling a preparedness to “conduct similar operations against Russians in Syria, Libya, or other parts of Africa.” But Middle East Institute Syria program non-resident scholar Anton Mardasov told the outlet that “frankly speaking,” Ukraine’s campaign is “more like fighting Russia where it doesn’t exist.”
“Now the media is actively promoting the trend that Ukrainian PMCs will fight Russian structures in Africa, for example, in Burkina Faso. In principle, this is nothing new – Russian and Ukrainian structures have competed before for the maintenance of Soviet military equipment in the Middle East and Africa,” Mardasov said.
Russia has rejected allegations of interference in Sudan’s internal affairs after the start of the deadly conflict in the country starting last April, with recent comments by Sudanese Foreign Affairs Minister Ali al-Sadiq Ali to Sputnik challenging the WSJ's narrative.
In an interview on Tuesday, Ali said Khartoum is looking forward to high-level negotiations with Russia, and reiterated that African nation would not object to the creation of a Russian naval base in its Red Sea coast, pending ratification of an agreement by parliament following elections.
“Russia has historically been and remains a friend of Sudan. Our relations have remained strong all the time. The Russian Federation is one of the countries providing the greatest support to Sudan in the UN and regional organizations. We will be glad if Russia plays a role in the country’s reconstruction,” the foreign minister emphasized.
In a separate commentary for Sputnik on Wednesday regarding the WSJ's piece, Ali emphasized that Sudan did not send weapons to Ukraine, saying this was "impossible, because we do not have weapons that could be exported abroad."
The top Sudanese diplomat also dismissed information about a Ukrainian diplomatic or military presence in the African nation.
* Recently added to Russia’s registry of terrorists and extremists.
