KHARTOUM: 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.
Sudan declares UN envoy Volker Perthes ‘persona non grata’
https://arab.news/nrm6v
Sudan declares UN envoy Volker Perthes ‘persona non grata’
Iran’s foreign ministry: ‘Time has come to defend the homeland’ after US-Israeli strikes
DUBAI: Iran’s Foreign Ministry responded to a joint US-Israel attack on Saturday by saying that the country “will not hesitate” in its response to the strikes.
In a statement posted on X, the ministry said: “The time has come to defend the homeland and confront the enemy’s military assault.”
Iran said it will “respond decisively” after Israel and the United States launched strikes on the country despite talks underway on Tehran’s nuclear program.
“The Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran will respond decisively to the aggressors,” a foreign ministry said in a statement, insisting Iran had done “everything necessary to prevent war.”
“Just as we were ready for negotiations, we are now more prepared than ever to defend the Iranian nation,” it said.
The US and Israel launched a major attack on targets across Iran on Saturday, and US President Donald Trump called on the Iranian people to “take over your government” — an extraordinary appeal that suggested the allies could be seeking to end of the country’s theocracy after decades of tensions.
The first strikes of the attack appeared to target the compound home to Iran’s 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in downtown Tehran. It wasn’t immediately clear if he was there at the time. Smoke could be seen rising from the Iranian capital.
“For 47 years, the Iranian regime has chanted Death to America and waged an unending campaign of bloodshed and mass murder, targeting the United States, our troops and the innocent people in many, many countries,” Trump said in a video posted on social media that sought to justify the attacks.
He urged Iranians to take cover during the strikes, but then: “When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take.”
