As Sudan descends into chaos in a battle between rival generals, one question was swirling around the country on Wednesday: Where is the former dictator Omar Hassan al-Bashir?

Al-Bashir is wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. In Sudan, he still faces charges related to the 1989 coup that propelled him to power, and he faces a death sentence or life in prison if convicted. The uncertainty over his whereabouts was another sign of Sudan’s descent into lawlessness and could deal a blow to the receding hopes of bringing democratic rule to the country.

It was thought that al-Bashir, 79, was being held in the Kober prison in Khartoum, the capital, serving a two-year sentence for money laundering and corruption. But then a former official being held with al-Bashir said on Tuesday night that he had left the prison along with some other, unnamed officials, without mentioning the former dictator.

That followed a statement by the Sudanese Army that inmates had been released after supplies of food, water and electricity to the prison were cut.

Then on Wednesday, the army compounded the confusion when it said that al-Bashir, who was deposed in 2019 after three decades in power, and four other top former officials, were being held in a military hospital and had been at the facility for health reasons since before the conflict began almost two weeks ago.

In its statement, the army said that al-Bashir and the four other officials were “still in the hospital under the guard and responsibility of the judicial police.” But it did not provide evidence or photographs of al-Bashir.

In an audio clip circulated on social media and played on television channels across the Arab world, the official who had been imprisoned with al-Bashir, Ahmad Muhammad Harun, said that he and other former government officials had left the prison because of safety reasons and would be responsible for their own protection. He did not mention al-Bashir.

Harun, a senior official in al-Bashir’s government, is also wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the western Sudanese region of Darfur from 2003 to 2004.

New York Times News Service