| Sudan’s Bashir ‘cancelled visit to Tanzania’ | Send to a friend |
| Wednesday, 14 December 2011 23:18 |
 By The Citizen Correspondent and AgenciesDar es Salaam. Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir reportedly cancelled a trip he was planning to make to Tanzania during the country’s 50th anniversary celebrations. Newspapers in Khartoum reported on Tuesday that Mr Bashir was headed to Dar es Salaam on Friday, December 9 for the celebrations and talks with President Jakaya Kikwete on “issues of mutual concern.” According to the Sudan Tribune, the embattled Sudanese leader, who has an international arrest warrant hanging over his head, was to be accompanied by his Foreign minister Ali Karti, Defence minister Abdel-Rahim Mohamed Hussein and minister of the presidency Bakri Hassan Saleh. However, he cancelled the trip in the eleventh hour because, according to the Sudan government, it coincided with the swearing-in ceremony for a new cabinet and was to be rescheduled. No senior government official was available for comment in Dar es Salaam yesterday. Foreign Affairs minister Mr Bernard Membe was said to be away, while his Permanent Secretary, Mr John Haule, referred our queries to the Independence Anniversary Organising Committee. But the Chief Secretary, Mr Philemon Luhanjo, who headed the committee declined to comment. The office of the Prime Minister could also not offer any details.Mr Bashir would have joined five other foreign heads of state who attended the ceremony, none of whom was from the East Africa Community (EAC). Tanzania along with Uganda recently voted against Sudan’s bid to join the EAC citing, among other concerns, the country’s geographic proximity to the region. President Bashir’s trip to Tanzania would have been his fifth to a country that is a signatory to the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court (ICC), which wants the Sudanese leader arrested for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region. He is the first sitting president to be indicted by the ICC. Tanzania would have been legally obliged to arrest President Bashir had he set foot in the country, but Tanzanian officials have said they will not honour the warrant in line with the African Union’s collective decision. “Much as we don’t condone impunity, if pursuit for justice was in conflict with pursuit for peace, peace must prevail,” Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation minister Bernard Membe was quoted as saying last year. Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites           |
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