Sudan's military ousted President Omar al-Bashir, ending his 30 years in power in response to escalating popular protests. The defense minister announced military rule for two years, imposing an emergency clampdown that risks enflaming protesters who have demanded civilian democratic change.
Al-Bashir's fall came just over a week after similar protests in Algeria forced the resignation of that North African nation's long-ruling, military-backed president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika.
Together, they represent a second generation of street protests eight years after the Arab Spring uprisings that ousted a number of long entrenched leaders around the Middle East.
But like those popular movements of 2011, the new protests face a similar dynamic a struggle over the aftermath of the leader's removal.
After the military's announcement Thursday, protest organizers vowed to continue their rallies until a civilian transitional government is formed. Tens of thousands of protesters were massed Thursday at a sit-in they have been holding outside the military's General Command headquarters in Khartoum.
The military's coup Thursday brought an end to a president who came to power in a coup of his own in 1989, backed by the military and Islamist hard-liners, and who had survived multiple blows that could have brought him down.
Over his three decades in power, al-Bashir was forced to allow the secession of South Sudan after years of war, a huge blow to the north's economy. He became notorious for a brutal crackdown on insurgents in the western Darfur region that made him an international pariah, wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes. The United States targeted his government repeatedly with sanctions and airstrikes for his support of Islamic militant groups.
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