The United States is considering removing Sudan from a list of state sponsors of terrorism, a senior State Department official said on Friday, reported Reuters.
In an interview with reporters, Tibor Nagy, assistant secretary for African affairs, removing Sudan from the list is a process that will follow a lot of conditions.
“It’s not an event, it’s not flipping a light switch,” he told reporters in a briefing. “It’s a process and we are heavily, continuously engaged with our Sudanese interlocutors on how we can go about doing that,”
When asked if the U.S. government was committing to lifting sanctions, Nagy said a no, but he added that there are a lot of pre-conditions attached.
“There are conditions to such an event,” the official said. “Everybody is hoping that it will happen, everybody is hoping that it happens as quickly as possible, we all understand the hardships that it is causing.”
Washington added Sudan’s name in terrorism-sponsoring countries list back in 1993 over allegations that then-President Omar al-Bashir’s Islamist government was supporting terrorist groups. The terrorism sponsor tag makes Sudan technically ineligible for debt relief and financing from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. The removal will need approval from Congress.
Months of mass protests against price hikes and cash shortages led to an uprising against former President Bashir, who was toppled by the military in April.
The military and the opposition and protest groups later formed a civilian transitional government in August that agreed with the United States that it would start working with international institutions while still being listed in the list of countries deemed sponsors of terrorism.
Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok has also repeatedly called out Washington to lift the sanctions in order to accelerate Sudan’s reconstruction and development efforts.
