Food Price Rioting Flares for 3rd Day in Khartoum; 5 Dead

KHARTOUM, Sudan —  More than 2,000 demonstrators rampaged through Khartoum and marched on the U.S. Embassy on Thursday, burning cars and looting stores in the third straight day of rioting over food price boosts. Five people have died in the violence.

A British Broadcasting Corp. report monitored in Nairobi, Kenya, said food riots have also broken out in other Sudanese cities, but Sudanese officials declined to comment on this report. The official Sudan News Agency said there were no reports of disturbances outside the capital.

The violence was sparked by increases in gasoline and food prices prescribed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to help save Sudan from bankruptcy.

The rioting, which began Tuesday, spread through Khartoum on Wednesday, hours after President Jaafar Numeiri left for Washington where he is to meet President Reagan on Monday.

Numeiri, at Walter Reed Medical Center outside Washington for a medical checkup, is expected to urge Reagan to release $194 million in aid that was suspended to pressure Sudan to accept the IMF-World Bank austerity package.

Sudan’s news agency said more than 300 have been arrested in the disorders and accused the Muslim Brotherhood--a fundamentalist Islamic group supported by Iran and Libya--of organizing the demonstrations.

Numeiri--who has quashed four coup attempts since taking power in 1969--has previously accused leaders of the brotherhood of plotting to overthrow his pro-American Islamic government.

Demonstrators rampaged through downtown Khartoum on Thursday heading for the U.S. Embassy, witnesses said. Riot troops used tear gas to disperse the mob several hundred yards from the heavily fortified embassy gates.

A Marine guard at the embassy said police and special army units were guarding the compound, across a dusty half-paved street from the main University of Khartoum campus.

The Sudanese president, implementing the austerity measures, announced elimination of price subsidies Monday. The move pushed the price of gasoline up 66% to $2.50 a gallon and boosted the price of foodstuffs like bread and wheat by about 50%.

Demonstrators blamed the United States for the price boosts. Special tribunals began trying rioters Wednesday night.