Sudanese army chief General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan told Al Jazeera TV the army was in control of the presidential palace, military headquarters and airport, after clashes had erupted between troops and a powerful paramilitary group on Saturday.

Burhan’s comments came in a recorded phone call with the Qatar-based network.

It followed a live phone interview the station aired with the commander of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), who said his forces had seized the presidential palace, the army chief’s residence and Khartoum international airport.

FACTBOX-The struggle for power in Sudan

The following outlines the struggle for power in recent years in Sudan, where clashes erupted on Saturday between the military and the country’s main paramilitary force:

WHO HAS BEEN IN CHARGE IN SUDAN?

Sudan began its halting transition towards democracy after military generals ousted long-ruling autocrat Omar al-Bashir amid a popular uprising in April 2019. Bashir, an Islamist long shunned by the West, had presided over the country for nearly three decades.

Under an August 2019 agreement, the military agreed to share power with civilians ahead of elections. That arrangement was abruptly halted by a 2021 coup, which triggered a new campaign of mass pro-democracy rallies across Sudan.

WHERE DOES THE BALANCE OF POWER LIE?

The military has been a dominant force in Sudan since independence in 1956, staging coups, fighting internal wars, and amassing economic holdings.

During the 2019-21 power-sharing arrangement, distrust between the military and civilian parties ran deep.

The civilian side drew legitimacy from a resilient protest movement and support from parts of the international community.

The military had internal backing from rebel factions that benefited from a 2020 peace deal and from veterans of Bashir’s government who returned to the civil service following the coup.

The coup put the army back in charge, but it faced weekly demonstrations, renewed isolation and deepening economic woes.

General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, head of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and deputy leader of Sudan’s ruling council since 2019, swung behind the plan for a new transition, bringing tensions with ruling council head and army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan to the surface. Dagalo is better known as Hemedti.