Eastern Sudan activist interrogated about social media posts

The Sudanese security service arrested an activist in eastern Sudan's Kassala on Wednesday, and held him until Wednesday night. He had published critical articles about the flour crisis in his state on social media.

Hamrour Hussein was arrested in his workplace and interrogated for several hours about his publications on Facebook, said Mohamed El Hassan Iheimir, head of the Democratic Unionist Party in the state.

He told Radio Dabanga that Kassala “witnesses an acute crisis of bread, while the flour quotas that must be provided to the bakeries are being controlled be the security service. Meanwhile the flour is smuggled to neighbouring countries.”

Particularly eastern Sudan has witnessed a shortage of flour since the start of this year. In the Sudanese capital almost a quarter of all bakeries reportedly closed their doors because of the issue, said the head of the state's statistical office. But the director-general of the Ministry of Finance, Adel Abdelaziz El Faki, contradicted this.

Economic experts claimed that the flour crisis is attributable to the shortage of foreign exchange currencies, and because there were no clear import policies for flour and wheat under the former Minister of Finance.