There are no distinctive features in the Port Sudan office. There is no sign on the outside and no indication of what is going on inside.
Young men who appear to belong to a rich middle class family can be dressed in modern clothing.
They are university graduates with shaved faces. However, they were accused of being part of a hard-hit extremist group in line with Sudan’s Islamic movement and being a frontline for the revival of ideologies that flourished under Omar al-Bashir, the dictator who ruled Sudan from 1989 to 2019.
In Port Sudan, which serves as an alternative government capital alongside the Sudanese Army (SAF), the Middle Eastern Eye met with members of the Albaleton Malik Brigade fighting alongside the Army. The SAF has been at war with Paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) since April 2023.
From this office, and from other offices in Sudan’s cities managed by the Army, the group is working to recruit and participate in the youth, organise their movements and transport to the battlefield, and coordinate with the Army’s special needs forces.
Members worked under the command of the SAF and claimed that there was no way to supply or fund themselves outside their military and their pockets.
They also emphasized that they will be institutionally dismantled after the end of the war, and that they have no ambition to take power after defeating the RSF.
Reappearance
Named after early Muslim fighters and fellow prophets, the Al Bala ibn Malik Brigade was founded as part of the Popular Defence Force (PDF), a paramilitary group of Muslims that fought the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), led by John Garan.
The PDF was dismantled after the uprising that removed Bashir in 2019, but this proved to be short-lived. I’m back in 2023.
Just before the outbreak of war in April of that year, some members of Al Bala ibn Malik reappeared in Hartzm, organising the breakfasts of Ramadan, giving rally speeches against the Framework Agreement, and were shattered between the Army, RSF and the Freedom and Change (FFC) Coalition of the Civil Forces.
Framework trade was one of the causes of the war, and the presence and influence of Al Bala ibn Malikh increased rapidly, especially after Army Secretary Abdel Fatta Al Burhan opened military training camps for those who wanted to volunteer to fight the RSF in the summer of 2023.
In an exclusive interview, Al Bala ibn Malik spokesman Amar Abdul Wahab Sid Ahmed said the number of fighters lined up in the army of a group like him, which he called “Jihadi” now exceeds 20,000.
“Since the first day of the war in Khartoum, young people from various political backgrounds have gone to the SAF camps to fight the RSF and receive military training to protect themselves and their families,” Sid Ahmed said.
“The same thing happened elsewhere in Al Jazilla and elsewhere, where they witnessed unprecedented atrocities, including mass murder, women’s rape, property looting and enforced displacement,” the spokesman told Mee.
According to Sid Ahmed, the group is expanding daily. The Arabic fighter jet, known as Al Baraon, vows to fight what is called the Sudan “invasion of the Emirates,” refers to the support of the United Arab Emirates providing RSF documented by the eyes of the Middle East.
Al-Bara Ibn Malik Brigade became very famous during the war, with hundreds of videos of young “jihad” fighting against the RSF appearing on social media.
The group’s growing influence, independent operations, slogans, banners, legacy, recruitment and other tactics have seen it be controversial.
A drone strike in Ramadan Iftar, where the group is being detained, left 15 deaths in April last year, months later, in June, its leader Al Misba Abjeed Tarha was arrested in Saudi Arabia after “conferences with many Muslims and several Muslims” in the kingdom, according to diplomatic sources who spoke to Ain.
Al Bala ibn Malik’s fighter jets have become famous for their trademark index finger symbol. They said it shows their orientation as an Islamic group.
This was a problem for Burhan, who personally acknowledged that the group’s prominent social media presence and openly declared jihad identity had sacrificed Army support from several international countries.
The leaders of Al Bala ibn Malik, who say their group is politically more jihadist than Islam, have also appeared in intensive clashes about the frontlines of war in the capital Khartoum, Al Jazilla, Sena, White Nile and other regions.
“It’s clear that the militia (RSF) is completely disintegrating, and it’s only a matter of time before the rest of the control pockets end,” Sid Ahmed said.
The RSF continues to control almost everything in Darfur, but the Army has recently gained significant benefits in Central Sudan and South Sudan and its surrounding areas.
“What we see on earth is a complete victory right away,” Sid Ahmed said. “We are cleaning the capital Khartoum and other states.”
Atrocity
The Al Bala ibn Malik Brigade has been widely and relied on committing terrible atrocities, including the indiscriminate massacre of civilians and RSF soldiers.
Sid Ahmed denied these charges. “Al-Bara ibn Malik’s army has no authority or authority to arrest or detain anyone,” a group spokesman said.
“We have nothing to do with violations. Furthermore, we work as a guerrilla army, and all these claims about Al-Baraoon’s involvement are the only lies and propaganda that are spread by the RSF and its allies.”
He said the group is running a special operation to protect civilians – Mee saw a video of people documenting the evacuation of civilians north of Khartoum – and said that the rumors that spread about them came from RSF and Tagadam, the civil groups that recently split up whether to support security guards or not.
However, on January 31, the UN issued a press release, expressing a deep warning in “an enforcement of civilians communicated by fighter jets and militias allied with the Sudanese Army (SAF) in northern Khartoum.”
The militia was the Al Bala ibn Malik Brigade.
“We are part of the SAF and work under the full command of the SAF and its laws and regulations,” Sid Ahmed told Mee.
“So, when we arrest someone who worked with the militia, we hand him over to military information without violence against civilians.”
The spokesman found himself fighting in parallel with the Army, including groups related to Sudan’s revolutionary movement, like borderless rage.
“For us at Al Bala ibn Malik, we are not generally representing a particular political group or having a particular political affiliation, but we only have one problem, one goal, one enemy, so we fight just to achieve these goals.
“We do not represent the National Congress (NCP) or other political groups,” he continued, referring to Bashir’s party.
“We come from different backgrounds, different occupations, and we only have the goals I told you, and we are working on humanitarian and private projects,” the spokesman said.
“When we finish our mission, this group will be disarmed, dismobilized and individually wishing to continue other forces like the military, intelligence news, police, etc., that’s entirely up to him.”
“We are fully under the direction of the SAF,” Sid Ahmed said. “Our only focus is defeating RSF.”
Mohammed Amin is a Sudanese journalist specializing in geopolitics and human rights abuses in Sudan and South Sudan, and is elsewhere in Northeast Africa. He works in many regional and international media. In November 2022, Loripeck Trust awarded the Martin Adler Award for work in the Middle Eastern eyes covering the Wagner Group’s massacre and Sudan coup.
Source: Middle East Eye