Sudan’s VP dismisses speculations about normalization with Israel

January 31, 2016 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan’s vice president Hasabo Mohamed Abdel-Rahman has emphasised that the ongoing dialogue conference won’t recommend normalization of ties with Israel.

The national dialogue initiated by president Omer Hassan al-Bashir last year has officially started in Khartoum last October amid boycott by main opposition parties and armed rebel groups.

Abdel-Rahman, who addressed the final session of the societal dialogue Sunday in Khartoum, said the Sudanese leadership won’t let down or betray its people, stressing that relations with Israel wouldn’t be normalized.

He underlined commitment of the presidency to implement the outcome of the political and societal dialogue, calling for abandoning verbal and physical violence and resorting to dialogue instead of war.

Last November, the head of the little-known Independent party and member of the dialogue conference made a request for normalization with Israel arguing that there was no justification for hostility towards Israel. He pointed out that this stance took a toll on the country politically and economically.

On 18 January, member of the dialogue foreign relations committee Ibrahim Suleiman said views on normalizing relations with Israel have varied between those calling for full normalization and those who reject the idea categorically, saying few members indicated the proposal could be adopted under specific conditions.

Suleiman described the position of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) towards the normalization proposal as “unclear”, saying the view which the latter presented at the conference calls for establishing good relations with all nations.

It is worth to mention that the NCP’s head of political sector, Mustafa Osman Ismail, had earlier said the decision to normalize relations with Israel must be made by the committees of dialogue conference.

Also, Sudan’s foreign minister Ibrahim Ghandour said his country wouldn’t mind considering the possibility of normalizing ties with Israel, underlining that Sudan doesn’t establish relations with one country at the expense of another country.

His statement raised strong reactions within the ruling party and Sudanese Islamists.
Sudan has no diplomatic relations established with Israel and remains hostile to the Jewish state on the grounds that it is occupying Arab lands.

Until recently the Sudanese passport had a stamp on it reading that it is valid for “All Countries Except Israel”.

(ST)