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Gold/Mining/Energy : TLM.TSE Talisman Energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: LARRY LARSON who wrote (1306)	9/28/2001 1:10:34 AM
From: LARRY LARSON	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1713

U.S. Will Support End of Sudan Travel Ban By Colum Lynch The Washington Post Friday, September 28, 2001 UNITED NATIONS, Sept 27 -- The United States today dropped its opposition to lifting U.N. restrictions on foreign travel by Sudanese officials in an effort to reward Sudan for its cooperation in the U.S.-led anti-terrorism campaign, according to U.S. and U.N. diplomats. The U.N. Security Council imposed the travel ban five years ago to punish Sudan's Islamic government for harboring members of an Egyptian terrorist organization that allegedly organized a 1995 assassination attempt against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. A State Deparment official said the United States is "certainly not going to veto" a decision by the Security Council to lift the ban when it comes up for renewal, possibly as early as Friday. Another official said the United States would abstain. The decision comes days after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell credited the Sudanese government for cooperating in the battle against terrorism. The travel ban has been largely symbolic, and has never been aggressively enforced. Officials said a much broader U.S. economic embargo, imposed in 1997 because of Sudan's poor human rights record and its possible links to other terrorist groups, will remain in effect. Even so, administration officials sought to portray the decision on lifting the travel ban as a clear message that the United States is prepared to reward countries that cooperate in its campaign to hunt down Osama bin Laden, the fugitive Saudi militant blamed for the Sept. 11 attacks against New York and Washington. "We will support those who are willing to support us," a senior administration official said. "But those who continue to harbor terrorists will be considered hostile." State Department officials said this week that the United States has been making progress in counterterrorism talks with Sudan during the past year and that the two governments have had further discussions since Sept. 11. U.S. officials "feel that those discussions are good, probably a beginning of cooperation that we appreciate and that we would intend to try to pursue further," said State Department spokesman Richard A. Boucher. The Bush administration has asked countries to crack down on groups affiliated with bin Laden, some of which are active in Sudan, according to senior U.S. officials. Bin Laden lived for six years in Sudan before fleeing under pressure to Afghanistan in 1996. Sudan has now moved against dozens of his militants in recent days. Though Sudan has also offered the use of its military facilities in a possible U.S. strike against bin Laden, a Defense Department official dismissed the likelihood that U.S. forces would have any need for Sudanese bases. State Department counterterrorism officials have been advocating an end to the five-year-old travel ban for some time. The Security Council was scheduled to take up the issue on Sept. 13, two days after the attacks, but the United States asked for a delay. The travel sanctions were imposed in 1996 after Sudan refused to extradite three Egyptians accused of participating in the attempt to kill Mubarak on June 26, 1995, when he arrived in Ethiopia for a summit of the Organization of African Unity. Sudan Airways allegedly arranged a getaway flight for the suspects to Khartoum. The militants, members of the Islamic Group terrorist organization that has been linked to bin Laden, have never been captured. But the Sudanese government says it has complied with the U.N. demand that it end its support for terrorists. The former leader of Sudan's ruling National Islamic Front, Hassan al Turabi, provided bin Laden and his followers with safe haven from 1990 to 1996, according to U.S. authorities. From his base in Khartoum, bin Laden provided weapons and military training to the Arab-dominated army in the north of the country in its war against southern Sudanese rebels, who are black and Christian or animist, according to testimony from Ahmed Fadhl, a former follower of bin Laden, during the trial in New York of suspects in the 1998 bombings of U.S embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Sudan in recent years has stepped up cooperation with U.S. counterterrorism officials in an attempt to repair its relations with the United States. It has recently placed Turabi in prison. Meanwhile, the United States sought the backing of the 14 other Security Council members for a resolution requiring that all countries freeze the financial assets of terrorists and cut off all other financial, military and political support or risk U.N. sanctions. John D. Negroponte, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said the draft resolution would expand the scope of intelligence-sharing among U.N. members and enlist their "operational cooperation" in the fight against terrorism. He said he is hoping to win passage of the resolution by next Monday. The resolution would mark a dramatic expansion of the U.N.'s role in the anti-terror campaign, essentially forcing governments to enact new laws to combat terrorism. It is supported by the four other permanent council members -- Britain, China, France and Russia -- who received a private briefing from the United States on the text Wednesday, diplomats said. Staff writers Thomas E. Ricks and Alan Sipress contributed to this report.