A key rebel movement from Sudan's Darfur region vowed to press on with its agenda for national reform on Sunday after confirming that government forces had killed their leader.
"We, the Justice and Equality Movement, announce to the Sudanese nation that the leader of the movement and the commander of its troops, Khalil Ibrahim Mohammed, was killed on December 23 at 3:00 am," London-based rebel spokesman Gibril Adam Bilal told AFP.
Bilal said Ibrahim, 54, was killed by a fighter plane directed by "a spy," and denied there was a battle between rebel forces and government troops.
"When Khalil was attacked he was in his camp," the spokesman said, vowing that the movement will remain true to Ibrahim's programme "to change the regime by all means, including military."
Bilal said one of Ibrahim's guards also died in the air strike. His statement came shortly after Sudan's army announced the death to reporters in the capital Khartoum.
Ibrahim was wounded on Thursday evening in a clash with government forces in Umm-Gozain, an area of North Kordofan state near North Darfur, army spokesman Sawarmi Khaled Saad told a news conference. "He died on Saturday evening" and was buried shortly afterwards, he said.