The governments of Egypt and Chad have announced their unqualified support for the ‘National Dialogue’ launched on Saturday in Sudan’s capital Khartoum by the ruling party together with several opposition groups.
Egypt’s Ambassador to Sudan Osama Shaltout said that his country “fully supports” the National Dialogue and he calls on all Sudanese parties who have not joined the process to do so as there is no other way to meet the national interest, according to a report by the Middle East News Agency.
The report by MENA, which was reprinted on an Egyptian government website on Sunday adds, “He underlined the strategic ties between the two countries, noting that since Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi assumed power, nine meetings were made with Sudanese President Bashir.”
Separately, it is reported that Sudanese presidential assistant Ibrahim Mahmoud Hamid, a member of the organizing committee of the National Dialogue, met with opposition Umma Party leader Sadiq al-Mahdi in Egypt.
Hamid has criticized the Umma Party’s position that the National Dialogue should be presided over by an eminent personality under the auspices of the African Union. Hamid says that this would amount to internationalization of the process and he called on al-Mahdi to return to Sudan to participate in the National Dialogue.
Meanwhile, Chadian President Idriss Deby arrived in Khartoum on Friday, bringing with him several Darfur rebel leaders who agreed to participate in the National Dialogue, incluing Abu al-Gasim Imam, Taher Hajer and Abdallah Yahia. Deby was received at Khartoum Airport by President al-Bashir.
In his remarks at the dialogue launch on Saturday, Deby urged the holdout rebel groups to join the National Dialogue process. He described the conference as an “historic event.”
Photo: Deby and Bashir at Khartoum Airport on Friday (SUNA)