FACTBOX-Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir

(Reuters) - Darfur rebels fought with Sudanese government troops in a Western suburb of the capital on Saturday and said their aim was to overthrow President Omar Hassan al-Bashir. The government said the attack had been defeated.

Here are some facts about Bashir:

ASCENT TO POWER

* Bashir was born in 1944 in the Nile Valley north of Khartoum. The son of a small farmer, he graduated from Sudan's military academy in 1966 and was a career army officer who rose to the rank of general.

* He served at least one tour of combat duty in the south against the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA). In 1989 he overthrew the democratically elected civilian government of former Prime Minister Sadeq al-Mahdi.

WAR IN SOUTH

* After nearly two decades of fighting in alliance with Sudan's powerful Islamist movement, his government surprised many analysts when it forged a peace deal in 2004 with rebels seeking greater autonomy for the mostly animist or Christian south from the Muslim north.

* A cornerstone of the peace was agreement that Islamic law, sharia, would not apply in the south. The application of sharia across the ethnically and religiously diverse country had been a catalyst for the war that broke out in 1983.

CONFLICT IN DARFUR