United States has formally removed Sudan from its state sponsors of terrorism blacklist, its embassy in Khartoum announced this on Monday.
The new development comes less than two months after the East African nation pledged to normalise ties with Israel.
The move opens the way for aid, debt relief, and investment to a country going through a rocky political transition and struggling under a severe economic crisis worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.
In October, US President Donald Trump announced that he was delisting Sudan, 27 years after Washington first put the country on its blacklist for harbouring Islamist militants.
US embassy speaking on the removal on Facebook said the measure “is effective as of today”, stressing;
The congressional notification period of 45 days has lapsed and the Secretary of State has signed a notification stating rescission of Sudan’s State Sponsor of Terrorism designation.
In response to the move, Sudan’s army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan — who doubles as the head of the Sovereign Council, the country’s highest executive authority — offered his “congratulations to the Sudanese people”.
Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok also welcomed Washington’s move in a post on Facebook, noting that it means “our beloved country… (is) relieved from the international and global siege” provoked by Bashir’s behaviour.
The premier said the removal of the designation “contributes to reforming the economy, attracting investments and remittances of our citizens abroad through official channels” and creates new job opportunities for youth.
As part of a deal, Sudan agreed to pay $335 million to compensate survivors and victims’ families from the twin 1998 al-Qaeda attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, and a 2000 attack by the jihadist group on the USS Cole off Yemen’s coast.
Those attacks were carried out after Bashir had allowed then al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden sanctuary in Sudan.
Sudan in October became the third Arab country in as many months to pledge that it would normalize relations with Israel, after the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
