Russia gets Sudan’s approval to build naval base: TASS

Russia and Sudan have reached an agreement allowing Moscow to build a naval base on the Red Sea coast of the country, the Russian news agency TASS reported, citing Sudan’s foreign minister.

“We have agreed on everything,” Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Youssef Ahmed al-Sharif said in comments reported by TASS. However, the minister did not respond to phone calls or text messages when Bloomberg reached him for comment on Thursday.

The idea of ​​a Russian naval base was first floated under former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, but its implementation was hampered by the outbreak of the civil war in Sudan two years ago.

Last year, the Sudanese military announced that Russia had agreed to supply Khartoum with weapons in exchange for allowing it to build a military refueling station on the Sudanese coast.

Bloomberg reported in December that Russia had sold millions of barrels of fuel, thousands of weapons and jet components to the Sudanese military, while Iran had sent shipments of weapons and dozens of drones. This support allowed the Sudanese army to regain control of parts of the capital, Khartoum, in addition to vast areas of land that were under the control of its opponent, the Rapid Support Forces militia.