The situation in Sudan will not affect the agreement on deploying the logistics point of the Russian Navy on the territory of the country, Sudanese Ambassador to Russia Mohammed Sirraj told Izvestia on Friday.
"This will not affect the agreement in any way. Maybe only the timing will shift because the political settlement in Sudan must be resumed to complete the democratic process of the transit of power," Sirraj said.
The difficulty, he said, is that the agreement must be ratified by the legislature, which has not yet been formed. Right now, Sudan has no parliament because the country is in transition. "When it ends, we will have an elected government that can take this agreement to parliament for ratification," the ambassador said.
"The base is a military infrastructure issue, but we could really use the ports at Port Sudan on the Red Sea to import goods from Russia and exports from Sudan," Sirraj added, when asked if the naval base could serve as a loading point for merchant ships.
The agreement between the countries on establishing a Russian naval logistics base in Sudan became known at the beginning of December 2020. The naval logistics point will be used for repair, resupply and rest of the crew members of Russian warships. According to the document, the maximum number of personnel of the Naval station will not exceed 300 people. Four Russian ships will be able to stay there at the same time.
GSV "Russia - Islamic World"
Photo: Christopher Michel/Creative Commons 2.0
Based on materials from TASS