Sudan's warring factions begin 72-hour ceasefire mediated by Saudi Arabia and US

The Sudanese capital was quiet on Sunday, hours after the nation's warring factions agreed to a 72-hour ceasefire mediated by Saudi Arabia and the US.

The truce went into effect at 6am local time. Several hours after it began, only sporadic gunfire could be heard in the sprawling capital, which has been pummelled by artillery shelling and air strikes since hostilities broke out two months ago.

Several previous ceasefire agreements were largely ignored by the warring sides, the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

Residents said army troops on Sunday consolidated positions in neighbourhoods around Khartoum airport, which was captured by the RSF early in the conflict. The army deployment did not draw a reaction from the RSF, they said.

A video clip shared online shows troops celebrating what they said were advances on the airport, which is located near the city centre.

The area around the airport was the scene of intense ground fighting in recent days.

As in earlier truces, the latest one demands that the warring parties allow safe passage for humanitarian aid to the capital as well as elsewhere in the vast Afro-Arab nation.

The UN says 25 million people in Sudan, more than half the population, are in need of aid.

A US-Saudi statement announcing the truce called on the army and the RSF to consider the suffering of the Sudanese people, especially in view of the humanitarian donor conference to be co-hosted by Saudi Arabia on Monday.

The statement also warned that failure to observe the ceasefire could lead to the suspension of peace talks currently taking place in the Saudi city of Jeddah. The talks, mediated by the Saudi Arabia and the US, have been going for weeks with the goal of reaching a lasting ceasefire.

The latest truce followed a marked increase in air strikes by the army. On Saturday, at least 17 people, including five children and seven women, were killed in a strike that destroyed 25 homes in the poor Mayo district in southern Khartoum.

There was no word from either side on the strike and it was not immediately clear whether it was caused by an air strike, artillery shelling or drones.

The army has relied heavily on artillery and air power in the conflict. The RSF, which is known to have drones, has gained a quick advantage in the war by embedding thousands of its fighters in residential areas across the city who are now proving difficult to dislodge.

The conflict, essentially a fight for supremacy, has killed 3,000 and wounded twice as many since it began on April 15, according to the Health Ministry.

The fighting, which has created what the UN says is a “humanitarian calamity”, has also forced at least 2.2 million people to flee their homes to escape the fighting. Of these, about 530,000 went to neighbouring countries, primarily Egypt, Chad and South Sudan.

Video clips shared online this weekend show hundreds of civilians marching to the Chad border from West Darfur, scene of intense violence instigated by the RSF and its allied militiamen.

At least 1,100 people have been killed in West Darfur since the war began, local activists said.

Darfur was the battleground of civil war in the early 2000s. The RSF, whose roots are in Darfur, fought on the government's side during that war and is accused of committing widespread abuses against civilians at the time. The war killed 300,000 and displaced 2.5 million, according to the UN.