KHARTOUM — Israel and Sudan agreed to press on with efforts to normalize relations during a visit by Israeli foreign minister Eli Cohen to Khartoum on Thursday, Sudan’s foreign ministry said.
It was the first by an Israeli official formally acknowledged by Sudan, although there have been a series of exchanges between officials from the two countries in recent years.
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Sudan agreed to take steps to normalize ties with Israel in a 2020 deal brokered by former U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration, alongside normalization agreements between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco, known as the “Abraham Accords.”
In January 2021, Sudan said its justice minister at the time, Nasredeen Abdulbari, had signed the Abraham Accords during a visit by U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.
Cohen and Sudan’s sovereign council head General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan discussed deepening cooperation between the two countries in security and military matters, as well as in agriculture, energy, health, water and education, Burhan’s office said in a statement.
“It was agreed to move forward towards normalizing relations between the two countries,” Sudan’s foreign ministry said.
There was no immediate comment from Israeli officials, but Cohen’s office said he would convene a news conference in the evening “upon his return from an historic state visit.” It did not elaborate.
As intelligence minister in 2021, Cohen made a ground-breaking visit to Sudan.
Sudan’s military, which has been in charge of the country since an October 2021 coup but says it intends to hand over power to a civilian government, is seen as having led the move towards establishing relations with Israel.
Civilian groups have been more reluctant and have previously said any deal must be ratified by a transitional parliament that is yet to be formed. (Reporting by Khalid Abdelaziz and Dan Williams; Writing by Aidan Lewis and Nafisa Eltahir; Editing by Alex Richardson and Sharon Singleton)
