(4 minutes read)
· The United Nations has urged the United States to remove
Sudan from a list of state sponsors of terrorism
· Arguing for international and multilateral help for Sudan,
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) administrator Achim
Steiner said that the story of Sudan in year 2020 is not the story of
the previous government
The United Nations has urged the United States to remove Sudan from a
list of state sponsors of terrorism. It sternly warned that the
international community would “pay a terrible price” if it fails to
help rebuild the African country’s one of the most fragile economies,
which is on a transition mode.
Arguing for international and multilateral help for Sudan, United
Nations Development Programme (UNDP) administrator Achim Steiner said
that the story of Sudan in year 2020 is not the story of the previous
government. After the nationwide protest movement that led to the
ouster of longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir in last April, Sudan faces a
severe economic crisis. Deprivation and poverty were a trigger for
the protest movement against Bashir’s 30-year-old autocratic regime.
Even months after the corrupt ruler was ousted, the economy is still
burdened with foreign debt of more than US$60 billion, inflation of
about 60 percent, soaring unemployment and chronic shortage of fuel
and foreign currency. This, the UN official said is the time for the
international organizations and other countries to step in to
ameliorate the severe challenges being faced by Sudan, which was for
long-suffering in the hands of a corrupt regime. Yet, the youth and
women of the country managed to oust the corrupt regime through a
peaceful revolution and they are eager to implement a regime focused
on development.
Despite that, the response from the international community to the
country’s reform process led by new Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, a
well-respected economist has been lukewarm. Washington’s continued
blacklisting of Sudan as a “state sponsor of terrorism” is a major
hurdle blocking investors and multilateral organizations to come to
the rescue of the country.
In October 2017, Washington lifted its 20-year-old trade embargo
imposed on Sudan, but kept the country on the terrorism blacklist
along with Iran, Syria and North Korea. UN wants Washington to delist
Sudan in the interest of the people of the country. Experts feel that
Washington seeking assurances that Bashir’s regime is being fully
dismantled may take time. However, the public opinion is that the
corrupt dispensation was ousted and it is time that the US shun other
conditions to bail out the fledgling economy. Hundreds of thousands
have been killed and millions displaced in the fight between Bashir’s
forces and rebels in these regions.
