The Sudanese government was forced to apologize to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday after a series of scuffles between Sudanese security and her entourage.
Officials and reporters traveling with Rice to the capital, Khartoum, were initially prevented from entering the compound of Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir. After they were allowed in there were further bouts of shouting and shoving, with one reporter being manhandled after shouting a question about alleged atrocities.
Rice, who then left the capital for a trip to the stricken province of Darfur, demanded and received an apology.
PHOTO: AFP
"It makes me very angry to be sitting there with their president and have this happen. They have no right to push and shove," she said
The scuffles, though minor, were a diplomatic disaster for the Sudanese government given the strained relations between Khartoum and Washington. The US withdrew its ambassador in 1997 and normal relations have not been resumed. The US government last year labeled as genocide the Sudanese government's policy in Darfur, where an estimated 70,000 people have been killed and 1.5 million displaced.
When Rice's motorcade arrived at Bashir's compound, guards shut the gates before the final three vehicles could get in. These cars included US State Department officials who were supposed to be at the meeting, as well as Rice's interpreter. One of the officials, Jim Wilkinson, was repeatedly pushed and pulled by security men.
After obtaining access to the compound, US TV crews and photographers were denied entry to the meeting between Rice and the president, though it had previously been agreed that they would be allowed in.
After they got in, another row developed. Despite objections by State Department officials, security guards refused to allow questions, shoved and elbowed reporters and tried to tear a microphone from a correspondent.
The entire press corps was bundled out after Andrea Mitchell, an NBC reporter, tried to ask Bashir about alleged atrocities in Darfur. Guards grabbed her and frogmarched her to the back of the room. Wilkinson shouted at the guards: "Get your hands off her."
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Osman Ismail had phoned Rice while she was on her way to Darfur to apologize.
At the Abu Shouk camp for the internally displaced, near el-Fesher in northern Darfur, Rice was in no mood for conciliatory gestures.
She said the Sudanese government, which has promised to end the violence in the region but has failed to do so, would be judged on its actions. "I said to the Sudanese government that they had a credibility problem with the international community," she said.
Relations between the US and Sudan have been bad since Khartoum offered a haven to Osama bin Laden in the 1990s. Rice hinted on Wednesday that relations could be normalized, but a US official said she had told the Sudanese government that Darfur was an obstacle.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
RSS