KHARTOUM: Sudan does not want to link its removal from a US terrorism list that is hindering access to foreign funding for the country’s economy with a normalisation of relations with Israel, Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said on Saturday.
Sources said this week that US officials indicated in talks with a Sudanese delegation they wanted Khartoum to follow the UAE and Bahrain and open ties with Israel.
Sudan’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism dates back to its toppled ruler Omar al Bashir, and makes it difficult for its new transitional government to access urgently needed debt relief and foreign financing.
Hamdok said Sudan had told US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a visit last month it was necessary to separate the removal from the US list from the normalisation of relations with Israel.
“This topic (ties to Israel) needs a deep discussion of the society,” he told a conference in Khartoum to discuss economic reforms. Sudan’s surging inflation and plummeting currency have been the biggest challenges to Hamdok’s transitional administration, which rules with the military since Bashir’s ouster.
Sudan was put on the US list in 1993 because the United States believed Bashir’s regime was supporting fighter groups. But many in Sudan consider this is undeserved since Bashir was removed last year and Sudan has long cooperated with the United States on counter-terrorism.
The White House and State Department have declined to comment when asked about the status of negotiations. Burhan and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a surprise meeting in Uganda earlier this year. Yet opening ties is sensitive, as Sudan was a staunch foe of Israel under Bashir.
Meanwhile, a Sudanese court has sentenced six artists to two months in jail for “creating a public nuisance”, a lawyer said, bringing the total number convicted in the case to 11.
— Agencies
Thursday’s sentence, which also saw the group fined 5,000 Sudanese pounds ($90) each, comes a week after the court issued the same ruling for five other artists, including prize-winning Sudanese filmmaker Hajooj Kuka.
In August, Kuka had said on Twitter that he and others were “attacked during a theater workshop in #khartoum by instigators. The police stood by the attackers and arrested us”. — Agencies
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