Talks aimed at ending Sudan's shattering 16-month-old civil war began on August 14 in Switzerland although the absence of the military dampened hopes for imminent steps to alleviate the country's humanitarian crisis.
U.N. officials have warned that Sudan is at "breaking point" and that there will be tens of thousands of preventable deaths from hunger, disease, floods, and violence in the coming months without a larger global response.
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has seized broad swathes of the country, sent a delegation to the talks but direct mediation will be impossible without the army present, U.S. special envoy Tom Perriello, who led the push for the talks, said this week.
The RSF leadership has denied many accounts of fighters attacking civilians and looting, and says it is open to a peace deal if the army engages in talks.
The army has said its absence from the talks arises from the failure to implement previous U.S.- and Saudi-brokered commitments to pull combatants out of civilian areas and facilitate aid deliveries. Mediators say both sides disregarded that accord.
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