(Bloomberg) -- Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said he escaped an assassination attempt which his government branded an attack on the revolution that unseated the North African nation’s veteran dictator last year.
Hamdok and his entourage were traveling to his offices in the capital, Khartoum, when they were targeted in a “terrorist bombing and shooting,” Information Minister Faisal Mohamed Salih said Monday in a televised address.
No one was seriously injured and investigations are underway into the incident, according to Salih.
“The people are capable of defending the fruits of the revolution,” he said. “All terrorist and sabotage attempts will be dealt with decisively.”
At the scene of the attack in the city’s Bahri district, police guarded four passenger cars, only one of which showed significant damage. It wasn’t clear what had been the source of the blast.
“Rest assured that what happened today will not stand in the way of our transition -- instead it is an additional push to the wheel of change in Sudan,” Hamdok said on Twitter in the aftermath. He added that he was “in good shape.”
Government officials held an emergency meeting on Monday afternoon, while al-Hadath, an Arab TV channel, reported two arrests in connection with the attack, citing its own correspondent.
Dangers Highlighted
The events underlined the dangers Sudan still faces as it attempts a transition to democracy following President Omar al-Bashir’s downfall last April after months of protests. Questions remain over the army’s commitment to surrendering power as well as the threat posed by disgruntled remnants of Bashir’s three-decade rule.
In January, mutinies erupted at three buildings used by the security services in Khartoum, in what authorities described as unrest sparked by agents who didn’t want to be integrated into Sudan’s army or its biggest militia. At least five people were killed.
The Forces for Freedom and Change, a coalition of protesters and rebels that helped drive the 2019 demonstrations, condemned what it called a “terror attack” by unidentified perpetrators that sought “to abort our revolution.” It urged people to take to the streets.
Hamdok, a former United Nations economist in his early 60s, was appointed premier in August after intense negotiations between the protest movement’s leaders and the army. The transitional administration, made up of civilian and military officials, is supposed to lead Africa’s third-largest country into democratic elections in 2022.
Bashir and his now-dissolved National Congress Party espoused a firebrand Islamist form of governance after taking power in a 1989 military coup, making alliances with Washington’s enemies. The U.S. listed Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism in 1993, later imposing sanctions that lasted until 2017.
In recent weeks, the new government has made a series of proposals -- including putting Bashir in front of the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and establishing Sudan’s first-ever official ties with Israel -- in a bid to restore its global standing. Authorities say the removal of Sudan’s terrorism designation is key to rebuilding the economy, shattered by decades of mismanagement.
The U.S. Embassy in Khartoum said it was “shocked and saddened” by the attack on Hamdok’s convoy.
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