President Backs Away From Visiting Border Region With Egypt

4 June 2011

Khartoum — The Sudanese foreign minister on Saturday denied reports that president Omer Hassan Al-Bashir intends to visit Halayeb triangle which is a disputed border region with Egypt.

This week the governor of the Red Sea state Mohamed Tahir Eila told the government sponsored Sudanese Media Center (SMC) website that Bashir will inaugurate developmental projects in Halayeb during his tour of the Red Sea state this month.

But Sudan’s top diplomat denied that Bashir has any plans to visit Halayeb.

“The president will visit the city of Ouseif which is outside the Halayeb triangle,” Karti told reporters following talks with visiting Egyptian foreign minister Nabil El-Araby.

Karti accused that the Sudanese media of “mishandling” the report and likewise said the Egyptian media responded in an unwise manner.

“Do not pour oil into the fire and we don’t want the will of the two countries to stop at this issue,” Karti said.

The outgoing Egyptian foreign minister on his end said that Halayeb issue does not present any source of tensions between the two countries noting that the area would become a “model for integration”.

“We have emphasized before that Halayeb will be a model for integration between the two countries, and we talk in this context and this region does not create any sort of tension in the relations between the two countries” El-Araby said.

“The Egyptian-Sudanese relations have entered a new stage titled sharing common views and pursuing the common interests of our peoples, and the dialogue between us covered all the political and economic issues,” he added.

It is not clear what prompted the change of heart by Khartoum and whether it was due to pressure by visiting Egyptian foreign minister.

But Karti said that the word “Halayeb” was not even mentioned at all during the meetings with the Egyptian delegation.

The Halayeb triangle that overlooks the Red Sea has been contentious issue between the two countries as early as 1958, shortly after Sudan gained independence from British-Egyptian rule.

The area has been under Cairo’s control since the mid-1990’s after a Sudanese backed attempt on former Egyptian president Mohamed Hosni Mubarak’s life.

Sudan has avoided registering voters inside Halayeb for the elections which took place last year despite earlier assertions that the region was included as a constituency.

But the issue of Halayeb flared up in July of last year when President Al-Bashir made a surprising assertion that “Halayeb is Sudanese and will stay Sudanese” while addressing a rally of his supporters at the coastal town of Port Sudan.

Egypt at the time dismissed the remarks stressing that its Southern borders “are well known at latitude 22°”.

Bashir has rarely brought up the issue publicly in order to avoid angering his Northern neighbor which has been one of his main backers.

AllAfrica – All the Time