The President of Sudan, Omar Al Bashir, has promised âto re-build the Sudanese Armed Forces and to equip them with up-to-date technologiesâ. He also undertook to raise army salaries.
Speaking today at the inauguration the Fifth Infantry Division Officerâs Club in El Obeid, capital of North Kordofan, Al Bashir said: âThe armed forces have the most advanced military factories in the region and weapons and ammunition used by the army are made by Sudanese factories,â the official Sudan News Agency (SUNA) reports.
Speaking in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief of the Sudanandnbsp;Armed Forces, Al Bashir added that âSudan has been enjoying a real peace thanks to the efforts of the military.
âWe will work to make salaries of members of the army be the highest in the country,â he said, pointing to âhuge sacrifices by members of the armed forces in maintaining the security and stability amid plots being interwoven against Sudanâs stability and security.â
Arms embargo
In July 2004andnbsp;http://unscr.com/en/resolutions/doc/1556UN Security Council resolution 1556andnbsp;imposed an open-ended arms embargo on all non-governmental entities and individuals operating in North Darfur, South Darfur, and West Darfur in reaction to the ongoing human rights abuses and deteriorating humanitarian situation in the region.
The arms embargo was strengthened by subsequentandnbsp;http://unscr.com/en/resolutions/doc/1591UN Security Council resolution 1591andnbsp;(March 2005) however UN panels of experts repeatedly observed military equipment in Darfur for which there was good reason to assume that it was delivered to Sudan after that date.
In October 2010andnbsp;http://unscr.com/en/resolutions/doc/1945Security Council resolution 1945andnbsp;further strengthened the arms embargo by deciding that all States shall ensure that any sale or supply of arms and related materiel to Sudan not prohibited by resolutions 1556 and 1591, are made conditional upon the necessary end user documentation so that States may ascertain that any such sale or supply is conducted consistent with the measures imposed by those resolutions.
Addis meeting
The office of the UN Secretary-General fielded critical questions regarding a confirmedandnbsp;meeting between Antonio Guterres and Al Bashiroccurred in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa on the periphery of the African Union summit in late January. At theandnbsp;https://www.youtube.com/watchŘv=EzNYtm4v8OYandamp;daily press briefing in New York on January 31, UN deputy spokesmanandnbsp;Farhan Haq told reportersandnbsp;that it occurred out of âoperational necessityâ, and that âthe rules of procedures were followedâ in terms of informing the ICC prosecution of such a meeting.
US sanctions
In October 2017, theandnbsp;USA issued a decision to lift a 20-year trade embargo on Sudan, however the decision leaves other sanctions in place for the time being, including those against individuals with arrest warrants related to atrocities committed during the conflict in Darfur. And it does not remove Sudan from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Yemen
In addition to those deployed internally, Sudan has had hundreds of troops in Yemen since 2015 to bolster the mostly Gulf Arab alliance fighting the Iran-allied Houthi movement. The coalition includes the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Senegal and Sudan.
In April 2017,andnbsp;five Sudanese soldiers were killedandnbsp;when Yemeni forces backed by the coalition took control of a volcanic mountain on a road toward the Khalid bin al-Waleed military base, a key stronghold of the Houthis in southwestern Taiz province.
In June 2017,andnbsp;17 Sudanese soldiers were killedandnbsp;and dozens more wounded at Midi of Hajjah province, in north-west Yemen.