The Sudanese security forces arrested on Friday Wissal Mahdi, wife of detained opposition leader Hassan Al Turabi, according to their son, Siddiq.
In a telephone call to Al Jazira satellite channel, Siddiq Turabi said that his mother, and a number of elder women in a addition to young supporters of Turabi were held by the police during a rally following Friday prayers at Khartoum University Mosque.
Commenting on a denial of the arrest by a security source, Siddiq said that “none knows who takes decisions in Sudan,” confirming that Mrs. Turabi called him from the security department where she was being interrogated.
Two weeks ago, 15 Sudanese political parties called on President Omar Bashir to release Turabi, head of the Popular National Congress (PNC), who is being held in a Khartoum prison.
The parties called for “respecting the constitution and lifting the ban on the PNC,” said a statement.
The government’s restriction on the NPC is a kind of "dictatorship, political oppression and persecution," added the statement.
Turabi, a former ally of Bashir, and scores of PNC officials were jailed February 21 after concluding a deal with the south rebels leader John Garang, calling for joint peaceful resistance to the government.
The SPLA has been fighting a civil war with successive Khartoum governments since 1983 – Albawaba.com
