Bashir denied entry into Saudi airspace
Print Edition
Saudi Arabia denied permission for a plane carrying Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to cross its airspace yesterday for the swearing-in of the new Iranian president, Khartoum said.
The aircraft had to turn back.
“The Saudi authorities refused to give the plane carrying President Bashir permission to cross their airspace,” Emad Sayed Ahmed, the presidential press secretary, said.
Saudi Arabia, a Sunni Muslim kingdom, has repeatedly voiced fears about the controversial nuclear program of Shiite-dominated Iran, whose warships twice docked in Sudan late last year.
Khartoum has tried to balance ties with both Tehran and Riyadh.
Ahmed said Bashir was not flying in his normal presidential aircraft but was using a plane rented from a Saudi company.
Sudan’s leader was travelling to attend President Hassan Rowhani’s swearing-in before the Iranian parliament.
The moderate Rowhani later took the oath at a ceremony attended for the first time by foreign dignitaries including regional leaders — but without Bashir.
Ahmed said that when Bashir’s plane entered Saudi airspace the pilot informed authorities that it had approval “and that it was carrying Sudan’s leader.
“But they said the plane didn’t have permission,” forcing it to return to Khartoum, he said.
The Hague-based International Criminal Court in 2009 and 2010 issued two warrants against Bashir for war crimes, and genocide over the conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region.
Khartoum’s links with Iran came under scrutiny after Bashir’s regime accused Israel of an October 23 strike against the Yarmouk military factory, which led to speculation that Iranian weapons were stored or manufactured there.
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