Chad shuts border with Sudan after cross-border incursion kills soldiers

Chad’s government says the border will remain ​closed until further ⁠notice, citing repeated violations by Sudan’s warring parties.

Chad has closed its eastern border with Sudan, the government says, after several Chadian soldiers and civilians were killed in recent days in clashes linked to the Sudanese civil war.

In a statement on Monday, Communications Minister Mahamat Gassim Cherif said the decision followed “repeated incursions and violations committed by the forces involved in the conflict in Sudan on Chadian territory”.

The closure “aims to prevent any risk of the conflict spreading to our soil, to protect our fellow citizens and refugee populations, and to guarantee the stability and territorial integrity of our country”, the statement said.

A Chadian official told the Reuters news agency that fighting on Saturday between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and militia fighters loyal to Sudan’s government in the border town of Tina killed five soldiers and three civilians and wounded 12 people.

The conflict in Sudan between the Sudanese military and the RSF, which erupted in April 2023, has periodically spilled over into Chadian territory, causing casualties and property damage.

Chad’s government said on Monday that the border would remain closed until further notice but added that exceptions could be made for humanitarian purposes with prior government approval.

Kholood Khair, a political analyst and founder of the Confluence Advisory group, said the closure means that even less humanitarian aid will be getting into Sudan “at a time where the famine rates … have skyrocketed”.

“But what the Chadians are hoping is that somehow they’ll be able to curtail the fighting and the violence in Sudan that is spilling over its borders,” she told Al Jazeera.

“I don’t think this border closure will necessarily do that. What it will do, however, is make it much more difficult for those fleeing violence in Sudan to make it to relative safety in eastern Chad.”

Chad has taken in nearly a million refugees from neighbouring Sudan, which descended into a civil war after a power struggle between its military, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the RSF, led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, widely known as Hemedti.

A border guard officer in Tina confirmed the deaths of five soldiers and said additional security measures were needed to protect civilians on the Chadian side.

Two sources told Reuters that more Chadian soldiers were being deployed to the area.

Sudan’s military and the RSF did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Last year, a drone attack killed two Chadian soldiers, according to local authorities and a security source, although it was unclear who carried out the attack.

Chad has reportedly served as a transit route for supplies, including weapons and drones, to the RSF although the Chadian government denies involvement.

Sudan’s civil war has killed tens of thousands of people and forced 11 million to flee their homes, triggering what the United Nations said is one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.