Eritrea Afewerki, Sudan al-Bashir to meet next week in Egypt

KHARTOUM, May 2, 2005 (Sudan Tribune) — Sudanese president and his Eritrean counterpart would meet in the Egyptian capital next week. This meeting comes as a direct result of SPLM/A chairman John Garang efforts, the independent al-Sahafa daily news reported today.

The source didn’t indicate the exact date of the meeting but expected ameliorations in relations between the two countries.

A quadripartite meeting between presidents of Egypt, Eritrea and Sudan with the participation of SPLM chairman would be held in Cairo.

During the last week of April, SPLM leader John Garang was in the Eritrean capital, Asmara, to hold talks with the Eritrean president and Sudanese opposition forces.

Sudanese opposition alliance forces have always repeated normalization of Sudanese-Eritrean relations is a top priority. The leader of the opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA), Mohamed Osman al-Merghani hoped the relationship between Khartoum and Asmara would return to normal before he returns back to the country for good.

Sudanese president Omar Al-Bashir last March had welcomed NDA’s Al-Mirghani mediation to normalize relations between the two countries, and asserted the need that such efforts should continue.