NUP Welcomes International Envoys Visit, Rejects Normalization of Israel, Interview
Introduction:
National Umma Party (NUP) is one of the leading political parties in Sudan. In the last democratic rule in Sudan before the 30th June coup the NUP had the majority in the parliament.
As Sudan is passing suffering political crisis, the Citizen Newspaper editorial board, within its endeavors decided to communicate with all actors in the political arena.
The Managing Editor of the paper, Omer Elhaj and reporter Idress visited the NUP Head of Political policies and Peace Committee, Mr. Imam Al-Hilu and conducted a brief interview on the present political moves.
Excerpts:
Q1: On Wednesday Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that 6 European Envoys will visit Sudan as well as the Russian FM. What is the NUP view on that?
A: the NUP welcomes the EU envoys visit to Sudan which will take place this week as well as Russian Foregin Minister, wishing that they will provide support to Sudan logistically,technically and directly in the current political process.
Q2: Last week a high level Delegation visited Sudan from Israel led by Israeli Foreign minister . What is the NUP view on the possibility of normalization process with Israel State and the signing of the Abraham Accord ?
A2: NUP since long time ago is against any normalization with the Zionist State. We all recall the three Nos of Khartoum Arab Summit ‘’No Negotiation, No Normalization and No Reconciliation”. The NUP did not change its position till this time. The reason is that Israel has refused 2002 Arab Initiative in Beirut. He The NUP rejects the ongoing steps of normalization between Khartoum and Tel Aviv as this should be approved by an elected parliament, affirming that the NUP stance is against normalization with Tel Aviv.
Q3: We know that some holdout Sudanese groups went to Cairo to participate in a workshop organized by the Egyptian government to bring together divided Sudanese political forces. What is your view on it and why didn’t the NUP take part in this Workshop?
A3: In last October the Egyptian government has invited us. The Egyptian initiative has come late and here we have signed the Framework Agreement in Sudan , but we hope the Egyptian Initiative will come out with fruitful results. It is untrue that NUP participated in Cairo workshop.
Q4: In an effort to unify the NUP, what are the steps taken so far, would you brief us on details?
NUP has large memberships in Sudan. In 2003 the party held its sixth conference which adopted decentralization after that conference. Accordingly elections were conducted in 18 Sudanese States to elect the political bureau in each state. We are the only political party that adopted this system. Our party has structure, foundation and democracy process in electing the leader. The NUP is open and its membership is available to all Sudanese.
Q5: On the ongoing endeavors to find a way out from the current political crisis, would you brief us on the moves of the NUP in this regard?
A5: This is a very important question, the framework agreement process came after 2021 October coup. NUP first initiated the roadmap to end the coup and resuming the transitional period and that was on 24th December, after one month of “ Hamdok and Burhan Deal”. Our party has direct engage with Forces Freedom and Change – Central committee – (FFC-CC) , FFC – Democratic Bloc meetings on January. On mid of January Volker Perthes has come out with initiative called Triple Mechanism, and our difference with resistance committee is that , we called on with Military to end the political crisis .
Then Quad Mechanism (consisting of the United States, Britain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (, until on 5th December the Framework Agreement was signed.