CAIRO (AP) – Sudan said on Wednesday that it had signed an agreement with the United States paving the way for the cash-strapped African nation to normalize relations with Israel and remove some of its massive debt to the World Bank. .
Justice Minister Nasredeen Abdulbari signed the agreement with visiting Finance Minister Steven Mnuchin, according to the prime minister’s office.
“This is a very, very important agreement. It will have a huge impact on the people of Israel and the people of Sudan as they continue to work together on cultural and economic opportunities and trade,” Mnuchin said in comments. which the state attached. SUNA news agency runs.
Abdulbari said Sudan welcomed “the rapprochement that has taken place between Israel and the countries in the region, as well as the beginning of diplomatic relations, after which we will work, to form our side in the near future, to strengthen and expand it. expand in the interest of Sudan and in the interest of other countries in the region. ”
During Mnuchin’s visit, the Ministry of Finance also signed a “memorandum of understanding” to facilitate the payment of the African’s national debt to the World Bank, a step that is widely regarded as an important step towards the recovery of Khartoum.
The ministry said the settlement would enable Sudan to receive more than $ 1 billion annually from the World Bank for the first time in almost three decades, when the country was declared a pariah state.
Sudan has more than $ 60 billion in foreign debt.
On October 23, President Donald Trump announced Sudan would become the third Arab state to normalize ties with Israel as part of a US-mediated agreement known as the “Abraham Covenants” after the biblical patriarch was honored by Muslims and Jews.
This followed after the North African nation agreed to put $ 335 million in a bail account to compensate American victims of terrorist attacks. These include the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 by the al-Qaida network while the leader, Osama bin Laden, lived in Sudan. The country also believed it was a pipeline for Iran to supply weapons to Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.
In return, Trump informed Congress of his intention to remove Sudan from the U.S. list of state sponsors for terrorism, a key impetus for the agreement.
There were no immediate comments from Israel on Wednesday.
The Trump administration last year announced diplomatic suspects between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain – the first since Jordan recognized Israel in the 1990s and Egypt in the 1970s. Morocco has also established diplomatic ties with Israel. The similarities are all with countries that are geographically far from Israel and have played a small role, if any, in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The agreements contributed to the serious isolation and weakening of the Palestinians by defending a long-standing Arab consensus that recognition of Israel should only be given in exchange for concessions in the peace process.
Although Sudan is not a local power station, the connection with Israel is deeply symbolic. Sudan hosted the Khartoum summit in 1967 where Arab countries promised never to make peace with Israel, and recently had closer ties with Israeli enemies such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
Sudan is on a fragile path to democracy after a popular uprising led the army to overthrow longtime autocrat Omar al-Bashir in April 2019. The province is now ruled by a joint military and civilian government that wants to maintain better ties with Washington and the West.
During his visit, Mnuchin met with Genl. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, head of the ruling sovereign council, and Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok meet.
This is the first visit by a sitting US Treasury chief to Sudan, the statement said. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in August the first U.S. diplomat to visit Sudan since 2005, when Condoleezza visited Rice.
The visit came at a time when our bilateral relations are taking historic leaps in the direction of a better future. We plan to make tangible progress today as our relationships enter a #NewEra, ‘Hamdok tweeted.
The Justice Department said last month that the US would provide a $ 1 billion bridge loan to the World Bank on behalf of Sudan, in addition to $ 1.1 billion in direct and indirect US aid.
Since the overthrow of al-Bashir, Sudan has been ruled by a joint military and civilian government that seeks to maintain better ties with the West. It is struggling with a large budget deficit and the huge shortage of essential goods, including fuel, bread and medicine.
According to official figures, annual inflation has risen by 200% in recent months as the prices of bread and other staples have risen.
Mnuchin’s visit comes amid growing tensions between military and civilian members of Sudan’s transitional government. The tensions, which have resurfaced in recent weeks, have largely focused on the economic assets of the military, over which the civilian finance ministry has no control.
John Prendergast, co-founder of watchdog group The Sentry, said Mnuchin should put the military and security apparatus under pressure to allow ‘independent oversight’ of businesses they control.
“As Secretary Mnuchin is involved in the leadership in Khartoum, it is critical that he weighs strongly in support of international standards for money laundering and fiscal transparency, which are essential for Sudan to counter the looting of its national economy,” he said. he said.
Mnuchin flew from Cairo to Sudan, where he met with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, a close US ally. The stopovers are part of a spate of activities during the last days of the Trump administration.
Mnuchin later tweeted that he was on his way to Israel ‘for important meetings’.
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Associated Press author Joe Federman in Jerusalem contributed.