Sudan’s central bank will receive a $1 billion deposit from Qatar as part of an aid package the two countries had previously agreed on, a senior Sudanese official has said.
The money was announced by Finance Minister Badr El-Din Mahmoud at the end of a one-day visit to Khartoum by Qatar’s Emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, earlier this week. Mahmoud also said that Qatar would be investing in the African country’s energy and agriculture industries, Reuters reports.
According to the Sudan Tribune:
“Sudan has been struggling with what was described as an economic shock following the loss of the oil-rich south in July 2011. Oil revenues constituted the majority of Sudan’s exports, national income and source of hard currency.”
Qatar has long held a friendly relationship with the Sudanese government, which has become increasingly isolated from other governments due to wide scale human rights abuses there.
Implications
Qatar did not publicly comment on the new aid, but analysts said that the funds could worsen Doha’s ties with Egypt.
AFP quotes Safwat Fanous, a political scientist at the University of Khartoum, as saying the Sudanese government is essentially supported by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Qatar’s ties to that group has been a source of tension between Doha and its Gulf neighbors. Last month, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain recalled their ambassadors from Qatar, saying they were worried about their internal security and stability.
This was thought to be a dig at Qatar’s independent foreign policy, which included support for the Brotherhood-backed former president of Egypt, Mohammed Morsi.
He was overthrown last year, and the new military government has designated the Brotherhood to be a terrorist organization. Saudi Arabia has since followed suit.
The Emir also visited Algeria and Tunisia this week, and returned home today, according to QNA.
Thoughts?
Interesting, check how this visit is covered by the press in the various GCC countries…
No doubt the Threatening Three are going over the top since the Sudanese government is classified by many to be part of the global Muslim Brotherhood 😉
Wow does Qatar not know when to stop making friends?
Whose business is it other than that of the Qatari and Sudanese people? Western politicians, under pressure from the US, have chosen to place embargoes on Sudan, despite the fact that it honoured the choice of South Sudan to secede. Now, as was foreseen, South Sudan is at war with itself, and neither country is benefiting from the hydrocarbon wealth beneath its soil. Sudan needs help to survive and South Sudan must end its internal divisions so that BOTH countries can develop. Qatar has identified the problem and seeks to find solutions – just because they do not suit the realpolitik of the US and its regional allies is no reason to confer conspiracy status onto the state visit or pledge of aid.
Yes the man who harbored OBL among other known terrorists, brutally massacred half a million of his own people in darfur,…just some realpolitiks of the US huh? Yes and S Sudan deserved their independence. Is it realpolitiks in action in Libya, Egypt, Syria who are also at war with themselves?
In fact it was Hassan Al Turabi who invited OBL to Sudan after Saudi Arabia expelled him. At the time Bashir and Turabi were still in a political alliance, but Bashir ousted OBL at the request of the US in 1996. OBL headed off to Afghanistan, where he rekindled his ties to the Mujahideen, gaining support and facilities for his war of terror. Yes, the same Mujahideen who beat the Soviets with Stingers bought with CIA money and supplied by Pakistan’s ISI. All consequences of Western realpolitik.
Bashir is just another grotesque military thug who hangs onto power through extortion and force, like so many others in Africa and elsewhere that we Westerners have found it convenient to deal with. Holding Qatar to a different standard does nothing to justify the crassness of US foreign policy.