Foreign Ministry Expresses reservations, demands revision of IGAD Communique

Khartoum – Sudan Events

Sudan has voiced strong reservations over the final communiqué issued by the Secretariat of the Intergovernmental Authority for Development (IGAD) saying the text has failed to accommodate the observations expressed by the Sudan and failed to include a number of points reached during the summit in addition to deviating from the agreed upon principle of consensus as the agreement was that the communiqué be sent to member states that would read and okay the final copy before it is made public, which was not the case here.
The ministry said it received the final draft only morning today and immediately informed IGAD Secretariat that it has essential and basic reservations and that it noted that some paragraphs were inserted without proper justifications and that the drafting was faulty.
“ In clear violation of what the statute requires of issuing decisions by consensus among members, the secretariat quickly issued a final statement without including the observations and reservations made by the Sudanese delegation. Therefore, Sudan does not consider this statement to represent what came out of the summit, and that it is meaningless until the IGAD presidency and its secretariat correct this “the Sudanese Ministry for Foreign Affairs stressed.
Earlier in the day, Sunday, IGAD secretariat had published the final communique on its website and X account saying the leaders of the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development (IGAD) have the consent of the commander of the Sudanese Army and that of the Rapid Support Forces for a meeting one to one to be prepared for and supervised by African leadership under IGAD and the African Union.
The IGAD Communique now disputed by the Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said the leaders of the east African development entity, who met on Saturday in Djibouti in an extraordinary summit, said they talked via phone with Hemaidti and got his approval for the meeting and also talked to General Burhan who said he would attend the tete a tete meeting.
The ministry said it was only the Kenyan president who talked with Hemaidti on the phone well after the summit was over, therefore it could not be said this was part of the summit, nor should it be included in the final communique.
The two sides, IGAD said in a lengthy communique, are also agreed to the implementation of the Jeddah declaration, brokered by the United States and Saudi Arabia, with the participation African union represented by IGAD.
However, the African leaders in their communique said they proposed the various regional, international and sub-regional imitative about peace in the ‘Sudan be unified and put under the IGAD and the African Union.