Sudan’s Split With Iran Boosts Saudi Camp

http://www.wsj.com/articles/sudans-split-with-iran-boosts-saudi-camp-1439460573

Byandnbsp;

YAROSLAV TROFIMOV

Aug. 13, 2015 6:09 a.m. ET

ARTOUM, Sudan—The whitewashed compound that once housed Iran’s cultural center here has overgrown with weeds. On the street outside, Sudanese motorists have learned to ignore the fading signs that prohibit parking to anyone but the now-departed Iranian diplomats.

For more than two decades, Sudan was the Iranian regime’s best friend in the Sunni Arab world, an alliance based on mutual support for political Islam—and shared hostility to the U.S. Now, that friendship between two rogue states has unraveled, another casualty of the sectarian strife that is ripping through the Middle East and a sign of Iran’s regional isolation.

Late last year, Presidentandnbsp;Omar al-Bashirandnbsp;ordered the network of Iran’s cultural centers in his country shut down, ostensibly on the grounds that they were propagating Shiite Islam in a country that has virtually no Shiites.

Then, in April, he unexpectedly joined Saudi Arabia and its fellow Gulf Cooperation Council monarchies inandnbsp;http://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-strikes-kill-dozens-in-yemen-1433687317the war in Yemen, sending Sudanese warplanes to bomb pro-Iranian Houthi forces. He also sought to nurture close ties with Egypt’s new ruler, Presidentandnbsp;Abdel Fattah Al Sisi.andnbsp;In a Middle East divided along sectarian lines, impoverished Sudan—the Arab world’s third-largest nation by population and size—for now has firmly placed itself in the Saudi-led Sunni camp.

“This regime cannot really survive without the support of the rich Arab countries. The Iranians, while they can help by giving arms, are not in a position to provide financial support,” explainedandnbsp;Abdel Ghaffar Ahmed,andnbsp;a professor at the University of Khartoum.

For Iran, this breakup with Sudan was a surprising—and bitter—diplomatic blow, sparking vitriolic comments in the conservative Iranian media.

“The tilt by Sudan toward Saudi Arabia is perhaps the most important victory for Saudi Arabia and the GCC in its strategic competition with Iran in the past decade,” saidMohsen Milani,andnbsp;an Iran expert and executive director of the Center for Strategic and Diplomatic Studies at the University of South Florida.

Sudan’s cooperation with Iran dates back to 1989, when Islamist politicianandnbsp;Hassan al-Turabiandnbsp;became the country’s de facto leader following a coup organized by Mr. Bashir. Sectarian tensions in the region were dormant at the time, and Mr. Turabi and his Islamist followers saw the Islamic Republic as a model to emulate, launching a brutal Islamization drive of their own.

“The relationship was very special at a certain point in time, when here the religious overtones of government were also very visible. It was a throwback to the times of camaraderie of revolutionary countries,” said Saeed el-Khatib, director of the Center for Strategic Studies, the Sudanese government’s think tank in Khartoum.

With Sudan subjected to U.S. sanctions since 1997, in part because Mr. Turabi sheltered Osama bin Laden and supported militant groups across the region, Iran became a valuable source of military aid. Iranian advisers helped Sudan build its own weapons industry, now Africa’s third largest after South Africa’s and Egypt’s, and trained Sudanese intelligence cadres.

The alliance continued even after Mr. Bashir took full power and jailed Mr. Turabi, then speaker of parliament, in 1999, toning down the regime’s Islamist zeal. Iran, in particular, used Sudan as a conduit to ship weapons to the Hamas militants in Gaza. According to the Khartoum government, Israeli jets struck Sudanese military targets on several occasions in response in 2009 and 2012, attacks that haven't been officially confirmed by the Israeli government.

Saudi Arabia, which sits just across the Red Sea from Sudan, didn’t appreciate this friendship and, in 2013, even barred Mr. Bashir from overflying its territory on his way to Tehran. By then, Sudan was increasingly broke—having lost three-quarters of its oil income after the 2011 secession of South Sudan. It was reliant on billions of dollars in remittances by Sudanese workers in Saudi Arabia and other GCC monarchies.

“We benefited very little from Iran. It was just weapons—but weapons for what?” saidKhidir Ahmed,andnbsp;who served as Sudan’s envoy to the U.S. in 2001-2006 and now teaches at the International University of Africa in Khartoum. “On the other hand, this alliance added to the isolation of Sudan. We had to do something for the survival of the country, for the survival of the regime itself.”

In late 2014, Sudan stunned the Iranians by demanding the immediate closure of their cultural centers in Khartoum and provincial capitals. In an interview with the Saudi-owned Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper at the time, Mr. Bashir said Khartoum “is working toward strengthening the Sunni community” and “cannot have strategic ties with Iran at this time [of] escalating tensions between Sunnis and Shiites.”

Even Mr. Turabi, who now runs an opposition party, welcomed the switch, albeit for pragmatic rather than sectarian considerations.

“Iran is a faraway country,” he said in an interview. “And there are thousands and thousands of Sudanese living in Saudi Arabia.”

So far, however, the Gulf countries have shown only limited appreciation for Sudan’s moves, wary of trusting Mr. Bashir—and conscious of the fact that the Sudanese regime remains under international sanctions for its war crimes in Darfur and other areas. Mr. Bashir himself is sought by the International Criminal Court.

Saudi officials “don’t trust him much but will give him the benefit of the doubt and will give him conditional support for as long as he stays on team,” saidandnbsp;Prince Faisal bin Farhan,andnbsp;a Saudi analyst and entrepreneur involved in the defense sector. “I think they see the Sudan move as a tactical victory for now—not yet a strategic one with long-term permanence.”

Given the depth and breadth of security links between Sudan and Iran, many Western diplomats and Sudanese politicians also suspect that the breakup isn’t as complete as Mr. Bashir has made it out to be.

In the Yemen war, “Sudan saw an opportunity and jumped on the bandwagon,” saidandnbsp;Ghazi Salah-al-Dinandnbsp;Atabani, a former presidential adviser and cabinet minister who broke with the regime to establish his own party in 2013. “I see it as a casual marriage of convenience. I don’t think it’s on principle.”

Write toandnbsp;Yaroslav Trofimov atandnbsp;mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]@wsj.com