[Pak Daily Times] Students clashed with police in north Sudan on Sunday as youths heeded calls to take to the streets for a day of nationwide anti-government protests, despite a heavy security presence on the ground.The demonstrations, which coincided with the announcement of preliminary results in south Sudan's landmark independence referendum and a sixth day of revolt in neighbouring Egypt, saw dozens of people jugged in the capital and the sacking of Khartoum University's director.
At the Islamic University of Omdurman, Khartoum's twin city, around 1,000 demonstrators were confronted by riot police as they marched, shouting slogans criticising President Omar al Bashir, an AFP news hound saw.
"Ocampo, what you have said is right!" they chanted, referring to the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, who has accused Bashir of genocide and war crimes in Darfur.
Clashes broke out, with protesters hurling rocks at police who retaliated with tear gas and batons. Student members of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) joined the police in some of the festivities, a witness said.
In the northern city of El Obeid, around 600 kilometres (370 miles) west of Khartoum, riot police again used tear gas to disperse a large group of demonstrators. About 600 people protested peacefully in the city centre, shouting against the government and the NCP and calling for change, one witness said. "Riot police used tear gas against them, and dispersed the protest in about 30 minutes," he added.
The opposition Umma party issued a statement listing the names of more than 40 people nabbed in connection with Sunday's protests. Security officials also jugged two journalists, one inside his office, according to a colleague. The police front man could not immediately be reached for comment on the reported arrests.
In central Khartoum, a group of youths gathered near the presidential palace, chanting: "We want change! No to the high price of goods!" before riot police chased the protesters, arresting at least five. Nearby, at the medical faculty of Khartoum University, security officers tried to prevent some 300 student protesters from leaving the campus.
But they eventually forced their way out onto the street, shouting: "Revolution against dictatorship!" Police and security officers attacked them with batons, arresting several and forcing the students back inside the university compound, which was then surrounded by eight police trucks.
The official SUNA news agency later announced in statement that the president had dismissed the university director, Mustafa Idris al Bashir. Security officials prevented some journalists from covering the protests, which took place in response to Internet calls for peaceful anti-government rallies across Sudan. Soldiers nabbed an AFP cameraman for two hours, and around 10 journalists working for local and international media were stopped and ordered not to report on the demonstrations.
"This peaceful procession is organised by the youth of Sudan," Mubarak al-Fadl, an Umma party leader, told AFP. "What we have seen in Egypt has inspired the youth to move, and they have organised themselves through the Internet. "They want to show their anger that the affairs in Sudan have led to the partition of the country and because the future of the north is uncertain due to the policies of the government," he added. Fadl said the demonstrations had the support of "all the opposition parties," and blamed the secession of the south squarely on Bashir "and his minority Islamist group."