US envoy meets Sudan president; reports of little progress in normalization talks

June 2, 2008 (KHARTOUM) – The US special envoy to Sudan Richard Williamson met with President Omar Hassan Al-Bashir to discuss the outcome of negotiations between the two countries on normalizing ties.

Sudan official news agency (SUNA) quoted the presidential adviser Nafi Ali Nafi as saying that the meeting was “deep, open and constructive in terms of the spirit and the goal of achieving positive results”.

Nafi said that both sides discussed implementing what Washington and Khartoum agreed on during the previous rounds of dialogues.

“The things we agreed on were implemented very satisfactorily and we reached a reasonable agreement on many other issues and both sides are happy” he said.

But the daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat published in London quoted unidentified Sudanese officials as saying that the dialogue “stumbled into the issue of Abyei which left no room to sufficiently discuss other items on the agenda”.

The US envoy told reporters today that he had little success in bridging differences between the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) and Sudan People Liberation Movement (SPLM) on the dispute over the oil rich region of Abyei.

The border area between North and South Sudan witnessed the most violent clashes last month between Sudanese army and SPLA that left at least 22 people killed and scores injured.

Aid workers, U.N. and Sudanese officials have described the town as devastated, with the market area burned to the ground and the majority of its population displaced.

The sticky issue of Abyei was left undetermined in the Comprehensive Agreement (CPA) signed between the North and South in 2005.

The officials told Al-Sharq Al-Awsat that the US delegation stipulated achieving security in Darfur and resolving the Abyei dispute “which meant the talks could not to advance a great deal”.

But Williamson said the talks “were not too bad” and said that the negotiations tackled the Darfur crisis and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).

However it was not clear if the bilateral talks have been concluded as scheduled. The head of US affairs in the Sudanese foreign ministry Abdel-Basit Al-Sanoosi told SUNA late Monday that the meetings will resume tomorrow to address remaining issues.

Many political analysts in Khartoum have suggested that the chances of normalizing ties with the US during Bush administration is getting slimmer not just because of the upcoming presidential elections in November but also due to the unwillingness by the Sudanese government to make the concessions requested by Washington.

Last week Al-Bashir told reporters in Seoul, Korea that he does not “anticipate the normalization of ties in the short term…. There are many obstacles and lobbies in the US that do not want to see positive development of this relation”.

Williamson met in Rome last April with a Sudanese delegation headed by Nafi and included Sudan’s spy chief Salah Gosh as well as foreign minister Deng Alor. The talks were considered a beginning of a new approach by Washington in dealing with Sudan crises.

News of the meeting drew widespread criticism in the US from lawmakers and Darfur advocates who think that the Sudanese government has not lived up to its previous commitments with regards to Darfur and partially to the North-South agreement.

The New York Times (NYT) obtained a series of documents exchanged between Washington and Khartoum on a series of steps to normalize relations between the two countries. The documents were leaked by an unidentified US official described as being “critical of the administration’s position”.

The report said that the Bush administration could remove Sudan from an American list of state supporters of terrorism and normalize relations if the Sudanese government agreed, among other steps, to allow Thai and Nepalese peacekeepers as part of the peacekeeping force.

However Williamson told US lawmakers that the report is “not accurate” and that if it was “he would not defend it and would not engage in it”. He further said that it was the Sudanese government which approached Washington on the requirements for normalizing ties.

“Concrete, verifiable, significant progress must be achieved on the ground before we can contemplate improved relations” Williamson told US senate.

Williamson also told a group of Darfur activists in a conference call sponsored by Enough Project from Washington that he does not foresee improvement of ties with Sudan “during his tenure”.

“There has to be changes on the ground before any improvement in relations” the US envoy said.

He further said that tougher sanctions remain an option on the table if the US president Bush deems them necessary.

But following the Rome negotiations the Sudanese government decided to release containers belonging to the US embassy that was being held by custom authorities in Port Sudan for over a year.

The containers contained equipments that were to be used for new embassy complex in south Khartoum that was under construction for over two years.

The daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat quoting unidentified Sudanese official said that the US administration agreed to “re-open a bank account for the Sudanese embassy in Washington” in return.

Last month Washington also released a number of Sudanese inmates held at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay.

The US Department of Treasury also appeared to have held back on punishing foreign companies for violating Sudan sanctions despite an earlier announcement in February of their intention to do so.

Moreover a coalition of Darfur advocacy groups in the US alleged that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) failed to provide clearance for a rule prohibiting federal contracts to companies believed to be conducting business in Sudan unless they certify otherwise.

The rule is mandated by the Sudan divestment bill passed into a law late December.

(ST)