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Liberals and Islamic fundamentalists battle over Sudan's future as reforms begin after bloody revolution

Soldiers are stationed at the trial of ousted former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir  - Mahmoud Hjaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Soldiers are stationed at the trial of ousted former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir - Mahmoud Hjaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Two years after Mariam Yahya married a young Christian she had fallen in love with, she found herself eight-months pregnant and chained to a prison wall.

A criminal court in a suburb of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, had convicted her of apostasy, leaving Islam for another faith.

When Mrs Yahya refused to renounce Christianity, the authorities sentenced her to be whipped 100 times for adultery and then executed for apostasy.

After spending almost her entire pregnancy in prison, Mrs Yahya felt the contractions start. She cried out for help, but no doctors came. Instead, she gave birth there on the filthy floor, the shackles still binding her to the wall.

The apostasy law which put the young woman in chains was introduced as part of a package of fundamental Islamic reforms almost three decades ago by the dictator Omar al-Bashir, which made Sudan one of the most conservative and repressive societies on earth.

But change is sweeping the vast northeast African nation and the ideas about the place of women and religion in society are beginning to be overturned.

In April 2019, Mr Bashir's regime was toppled after months of peaceful protests where ordinary people took to the streets chanting for liberty, justice and peace.

The country of 41m is currently led by an uneasy alliance of the transitional government headed by Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and ruthless factions of the Sudanese military.

Decades of conflict, corruption and mismanagement under Mr Bashir have left the Sudanese economy in tatters. Now a battle is raging over Sudan's future between the country's liberalisers and Islamic fundamentalists backed by powerful actors in the Gulf.

Last month, the government announced a raft of liberal reforms. It repealed punishments for the apostasy law, banned female genital mutilation, said that children could no longer be executed, and that the religious police were not allowed to whip moral offenders.

The government also said that mothers would be allowed to travel with their children without a permit from their husband and that Christians could drink alcohol and it also relaxed dress codes for women.

A vehicle carrying Sudan's ousted president Omar al-Bashir - ASHRAF SHAZLY/AFP via Getty Images
A vehicle carrying Sudan's ousted president Omar al-Bashir - ASHRAF SHAZLY/AFP via Getty Images

"We assure our people that the legal reformation will continue until we drop all the laws violating the human rights in Sudan," Nasredeen Abdulbari, the justice minister, said on state TV.

Analysts say the reforms are part of a desperate attempt by Mr Hamdok’s government to woo officials in Washington and show their reformist credentials.

The country has been an international pariah state since the 1990s when the US listed Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism because Mr Bashir prosecuted Christians, supported Al Qaeda and hosted Osama Bin Laden.

"Religious freedoms are a foreign policy priority for the US. Mr Hamdok's government hopes that this will [create] better relations," said Mohamed Salih, an activist who had to flee Sudan in 2017 after declaring himself an atheist.

Khartoum's reforms do seem to be winning over Washington. On Thursday, the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he wanted to de-list Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism "in the very, very near term."

However, the new laws have incensed many of the supporters of the old Islamist regime. Just a few days after the justice minister announced the reforms, thousands of fundamentalists took to the streets of the capital and called for the overthrow of the government, shouting: "This is Khartoum, not New York.”

Supporters of ousted former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir shout slogans at the Judicial and Legal Science Institute - Mahmoud Hjaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Supporters of ousted former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir shout slogans at the Judicial and Legal Science Institute - Mahmoud Hjaj/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images


Activists told The Telegraph they welcomes the reforms as an important step on the road towards liberalisation.

“This is a step in the right direction. For the first time, there is a degree of religious freedom in the country,” said Ahmed Elzobier, a Sudanese researcher from Amnesty International.

However, for many liberals who marched through the streets of Khartoum against the country’s vicious security forces, the reforms do not go far enough.

“The reforms do not live up to the revolution,” said Mr Salih, adding that while the transitional government wanted to please the international community, it was scared to push the fundamentalists too far.

Osman Mubarak, a lawyer who worked on Mrs Yahya's defence team, welcomed the amendment to the apostasy law but he said he was worried some of the new reforms were too vague and still left too much power in the hands of the police.

After Mrs Yahya gave birth to her child in prison, massive international pressure meant she was released in 2014 and granted asylum in the US. She told The Telegraph that while she welcomed the recent reforms Sudan, there is still had a long way to go.

"The step to abolish the apostasy law is good because religion is a personal freedom, but it is not just about apostasy," she said. "It is also about the rights of Christians. Over the last few years, Christians have had their lands and property confiscated, and this has not been resolved."