chargement...
As announced by the Sudanese news agency on Thursday morning, President Omar Al-Bachir has arrived at the Tangier airport. He then headed to the residence of King Salmane where he was warmly received.
Al-Bashir was greeted by Mohamed Ben Salmane, the Crown Prince, and Foreign Minister Abdel Al Joubeir. The Saudi national TV said that the Wahhabi king and his host had lunch together and discussed «bilateral relations».
Ten days ago, several NGOs were angered by Al-Bashir’s trip to the Kingdom calling the Moroccan government to scrap the visit, and claiming that he is subject to two international arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court(ICC). In March 2009, Al-Bashir became the first sitting president to be indicted by the ICC, for allegedly directing a campaign of mass killing, rape, and pillage against civilians in Darfur. In July 2010, the Court issued a second warrant containing three separate counts.
The Sudanese president has been known for having repeatedly defied international justice. In 2015, a South African court seized by an NGO had banned the 71-year-old Sudanese president elected since 1989 from leaving South Africa after attending the African Union summit. But he ended up joining his country at the end of the event. Denouncing the Sudanese president’s visit, 40 signatories declared to AFP that «the visit by someone with blood on their hands does no honor to our country».
Al-Bashir’s third visit to Morocco
Al-Bashir attended COP22 in November 2016, a trip that no one commented on including the United Nations, European Union countries and the Moroccan civil society. Moreover, Al Bachir, had also met King Salmane in July 2016 in Tangier.
For the record, Morocco one of the countries that did not vote for the treaty regarding the Intarnational Criminal Court. Sudan and Morocco are also part of the Arab coalition engaged in the Saudi war in Yemen that did not cut diplomatic ties with Qatar.
During a visit to Khartoum in July 2016, former Moroccan Foreign Minister Salaheddine Mezouar announced from Sudan that King Mohammed VI had invited the Sudanese President to Rabat. Transmitting the invitation to the Sudanese president, Mezouar said that Sudan and Morocco are facing the same foreign challenges and threats.
