Sudan declares UN envoy Volker Perthes ‘persona non grata’

KHARTOUM (AFP): The Sudanese government has declared United Nations envoy Volker Perthes “persona non grata,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced.

“The Government of the Republic of Sudan has notified the Secretary-General of the United Nations that it has declared Mr. Volker Perthes … persona non grata as of today,” the ministry said in a statement on Thursday, just weeks after army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan accused Perthes of stoking the country’s conflict and requested his removal.

Perthes was in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on Thursday for a series of diplomatic talks, according to the UN mission’s Twitter feed.

Since late last year, Perthes and the UN mission he heads in war-torn Sudan have been targeted by military and Islamist-backed protests denouncing perceived foreign interference.

In a letter to the UN last month, Sudan’s de facto leader Burhan blamed the envoy for exacerbating fighting between the army and the paramilitaries, accused him of not respecting “national sovereignty” and demanded he be replaced.

UN chief Antonio Guterres and members of the UN Security Council have stood by Perthes.

But last week, the Security Council voted to extend the UN Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS)’s mandate for just six months.

Created in June 2020 to support Sudan’s democratic transition after the fall of Omar Al-Bashir a year earlier, UNITAMS had previously been renewed annually for a year.