Not long after, Lieutenant General Omar al-Bashir, backed by an Islamist political party, the National Islamic Front, overthrew the short lived government in a coup in 1989 where he ruled as President until his fall in April 2019.

His regime was criticized for human rights abuses, atrocities and genocide in Darfur and allegations of harboring and supporting terrorist groups (most notably during the residency of Osama bin Laden from 1992 to 1996) in the region while being subjected to United Nations sanctions beginning in 1995, resulting in Sudan's isolation as an international pariah.

After less than a year in office, Sadiq dismissed the government because it had failed to draft a new penal code to replace Sharia law, reach an agreement with the IMF, end the civil war in the south, or devise a scheme to attract remittances from Sudanese expatriates.

Shortly thereafter armed forces commander in chief Lieutenant General Fathi Ahmad Ali presented an ultimatum, signed by 150 senior military officers, to Sadiq al-Mahdi demanding that he make the coalition government more representative and that he announce terms for ending the civil war.

On June 30, 1989, Colonel (later Lieutenant General) Umar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir overthrew Sadiq and established the Revolutionary Command Council for National Salvation to rule Sudan.

Bashir's commitment to imposing the Sharia on the non-Muslim south and to seeking a military victory over the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), however, seemed likely to keep the country divided for the foreseeable future and hamper resolution of the same problems faced by Sadiq al-Mahdi.

The rebels have alleged that these militias have been engaging in ethnic cleansing in Darfur, and the fighting has displaced hundreds of thousands of people, many of them seeking refuge in neighboring Chad.

On September 18, 2004 United Nations Security Council issued Resolution 1564 declaring that the government of Sudan had not met its commitments, expressing concern at helicopter attacks and assaults by the Janjaweed militia against villages in Darfur.

In the following months, however, UNMIS was not able to deploy to Darfur due to the Government of Sudan's steadfast opposition to a peacekeeping operation undertaken solely by the United Nations.

The UN then embarked on an alternative, innovative approach to try to begin stabilize the region through the phased strengthening of AMIS, before transfer of authority to a joint African Union/United Nations peacekeeping operation.

[9] On 19 December 2018, massive protests began after a government decision to triple the price of goods at a time when the country was suffering an acute shortage of foreign currency and inflation of 70 percent.

The government retaliated by arresting more than 800 opposition figures and protesters, leading to the death of approximately 40 people according to the Human Rights Watch,[11] although the number was much higher than that according to local and civilian reports.

The protests continued after the overthrow of his government on 11 April 2019 after a massive sit-in in front of the Sudanese Armed Forces main headquarters, after which the chiefs of staff decided to intervene and they ordered the arrest of President al-Bashir and declared a three-month state of emergency.

[12][13][14] Over 100 people died on 3 June after security forces dispersed the sit-in using tear gas and live ammunition in what is known as the Khartoum massacre,[15][16] resulting in Sudan's suspension from the African Union.

[21] He initiated talks with the IMF and World Bank aimed at stabilising the economy, which was in dire straits because of shortages of food, fuel and hard currency.

[23][24] As of August 2021, the country was jointly led by Chairman of the Transitional Sovereign Council, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and Prime Minister Abdallah Hamdok.

[25] From the early 1990s, after al-Bashir assumed power, Sudan backed Iraq in its invasion of Kuwait[26][27] and was accused of harboring and providing sanctuary and assistance to Islamic terrorist groups.

Carlos the Jackal, Osama bin Laden, Abu Nidal and others labeled "terrorist leaders" by the United States and its allies resided in Khartoum.

In late 1994, in an initial effort to reverse his nation's growing image throughout the world as a country harboring terrorists, Bashir secretly cooperated with French special forces to orchestrate the capture and arrest on Sudanese soil of Carlos the Jackal.

The US demand list also encouraged Bashir's regime to move away from activities, such as hosting the Popular Arab and Islamic Congress, that impinged on Sudanese efforts to reconcile with the West.

The Sudanese insisted that an offer to extradite bin Laden had been made in a secret one-on-one meeting at a Fairfax hotel between Erwa and the then CIA Africa Bureau chief on condition that Washington end sanctions against Bashir's regime.

In a joint opinion piece in the Washington Post Outlook Section in 2003, Carney and Ijaz argued that in fact the Sudanese had offered to extradite bin Laden to a third country in exchange for sanctions relief.

Ijaz conveyed his findings to US officials upon his return, including Sandy Berger, then Clinton's deputy national security adviser, and argued for the US to constructively engage the Sudanese and other Islamic countries.

[41] in 1997, after the U.S. placed sanctions on Sudan, banning all American companies from engaging in its oil sector, after allegations that the government of Omar al-Bashir was supporting terrorists and committing human rights violations.

This appeal came at an opportune moment since China had grown considerable interest in acquiring foreign oil reserves as its own oilfields had already surpassed peak production.