Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir invited Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta to Khartoum on Monday, and the Nairobi government indicated that Bashir would be welcome in Nairobi, signalling closer ties between the only two sitting heads of state to be indicted by the International Criminal Court.
Bashir is wanted by the ICC for committing genocide in Sudan’s Darfur region. The Hague-based court charged Kenyatta with murder, rape, forced displacement, and other inhumane acts committed during Kenya’s 2007-8 post-election violence.
The ICC dropped Kenyatta’s case earlier this month, while the prosecutor shelved Bashir’s case last week.
Sudan’s Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Ahmed Karti invited Kenyatta to Khartoum during a meeting with the president in Nairobi where they discussed the ICC, Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper reported.
Kenyan Foreign Minister Amina Momahed said Kenyatta would “hopefully” visit Khartoum in the first quarter of 2015, “and after that we are also hopeful that President Bashir will also pay us a visit,” the paper said.
Mohamed’s statement suggests authorities in Kenya would not arrest Bashir if he visited Nairobi, despite two outstanding warrants for Bashir’s arrest issued by the ICC and Kenya’s own judiciary.
In 2011, a Kenyan High Court judge ordered Bashir be arrested if “he ever sets foot” in Kenya, citing Kenya’s membership in the ICC, said the Daily Nation. Bashir was the only regional head of state who did not attend Kenyatta’s 2013 inauguration.
Besides discussing the ICC, Kenyatta and Karti agreed “to share information and ideas” on security matters, according to a press release from the Kenyan presidency.
The ICC dropped Kenyatta’s case due to lack of evidence. ICC judges said Kenya’s government did not cooperate with handing over evidence, and the prosecutor alleged widespread intimidation and bribery of witnesses against the Kenyan president.
The prosecutor shelved, but did not drop, Bashir’s case because of lack of action by the United Nations Security Council.