Sudan eyes thaw in ties with US: official
February 3, 2011 (NAIROBI) – Sudan is expecting the recent flurry of meetings between American and Sudanese diplomats to bring about a normalization in ties with the ultimate goal of removing Sudan’s name from the US blacklist of countries sponsoring terrorism and remedying Sudan’s debts problem, a Sudanese diplomat said today.
Sudan foreign minister Ali Karti recently returned from Washington where he held talks with the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other US officials to discuss upgrading bilateral relations.
Karti’s visit was followed this Wednesday witha visit to Khartoum by U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James B. Steinberg who held a series of meetings with several Sudanese officials, including Karti, Vice President Ali Osman Taha, Presidential Assistant Nafie Ali Nafie, and Presidential Adviser for Security Affairs, Salah Gosh.
Steinberg told reporters in Khartoum that the two countries had agreed on a roadmap to serve common interests and normalize relations.
Ambassador Rahma Osman said he hoped that this step would lead to lifting Sudan’s name from the terrorism list and waving economic sanctions, citing promises made by Obama that Washington is committed to taking these steps if Sudan conducts the referendum on South Sudan independence and recognize its outcome.
Sudan has been under US economic sanctions since 1997 over alleged support of terrorism and recently over the situation in the western region of Darfur, where nearly 300.000 people were killed and millions were displaced since the conflict between government forces and rebel groups erupted in 2003, according to UN figures.
Last month, Sudan successfully organized a referendum vote in which the citizens of South Sudan voted almost unanimously for secession from the north. The plebiscite was promised under the US-brokered Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) which in 2005 ended more than two decades of north-south civil war.
US officials including President Obama promised a set of incentives to Khartoum if it ensured peaceful referendum and respected it outcome.
Sudan declared it would abide by the referendum outcome but the US Administration appears to have raised the ceiling of its demands to include a resolution to post-referendum arrangements with the south, including the issues of borders, division of oil revenues, and status of the hotly contested region of Abyei which straddles north-south borders.
State Department spokesman Phillip Crowley said the United States could begin the legal process of dropping Sudan from the list in the next couple of weeks if northern and southern Sudanese leaders agree on how to work out several key issues unresolved by referendum.
Rahma further expressed hope that the recent lifting of US sanctions on agriculture imports “will be followed by other [steps] in the coming period.”
The Sudanese diplomat also said that Washington was showing positive signs that it would help Sudan in its quest to forgive its external debts.
Sudan has been strenuously lobbying to galvanize international support to waive its external debts, which currently stands at ($35.7 billion) according to official figures.
Sudanese officials previously accused the political will of the U.S Administration of derailing efforts to relief the country’s debts.
According to Rahma, the promotion of diplomatic representation to the level of ambassadors is also among the promises made by the US Administration.
The level of diplomatic representation between the two countries is currently at Charge D’affaires level.
(ST)