Accelerating Regional Shifts Against Militia-Based Fragmentation Projects

The Arab region and the Horn of Africa are undergoing a decisive regional reassessment marked by a growing rejection of external projects that rely on armed militias, to sow the seeds of civil wars and conflicts, thereby, undermine state sovereignty.

This shift reflects the declining viability of the UAE-backed model that has operated through non-state armed actors in the Horn of Africa, during the course of which, Sudan has become the clearest testing ground for this confrontation.

Effectively, attempts to legitimize the RSF militia, as a militia-based alternative to the state, have failed due to the cohesion of the Sudanese Armed Forces, expanding popular support for constitutional legitimacy, besides the rising in regional concern over the destabilizing consequences of Sudan’s fragmentation.

In fact, this very awareness is currently manifesting itself in the ongoing coordinated regional measures to close airspace and logistical corridors, that would significantly weaken the external supply chains, sustaining militias.

This reflects a broader convergence among key regional actors, around rejecting any political settlement imposed through armed groups and affirming support for Sudan’s constitutional legitimacy under General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.

Experiences in Yemen and Libya demonstrate that reliance on militias produces prolonged conflict, institutional erosion, and chronic instability.

These precedents have accelerated regional and international recognition that empowering armed proxies is incompatible with sustainable peace.

To that effect the recent Somalia’s decision to cancel all agreements with the UAE, represents a clear political message that regional states are increasingly unwilling to tolerate external interventions that compromise sovereignty under economic or security pretexts.

In fact, Somalia’s decision constitutes a clear and unambiguous political message: the era of acquiescing to destabilizing external roles, disguised as investment or security cooperation, is coming to an end.

Now, it seems clear on the horizon that a regional consensus is gradually forming around state-centric stabilization, prioritizing national armies and constitutional institutions over militias.

Fragmentation projects are now widely viewed as sources of cross-border insecurity rather than tools of influence. Likewise, neutrality toward militia-backed interventions is becoming politically untenable.

Our regional organizations will have a big role to play;

reaffirming their respective principled position - essentially consistent with its founding charters- condemning external support for militias and reassuring its unambiguous political backing to Sudanese constitutional legitimacy.

In other words, supporting sovereign state structures is no longer a normative preference, but a regional security imperative.

This sincere appeal also goes to some of Sudan's neighbors, which have directly or indirectly facilitated militia support; recognizing that continued instability in Sudan will inevitably spillover, affecting their own security.

Unmistakably, stability cannot be achieved through militias, nor peace could be built by weakening national institutions.

In conclusion, Sudan’s future will be a defining test of this new regional awareness—and of who ultimately stands on the right side of history.