Al Bashir to attend Saudi summit

GENEVA. - Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir will attend a gathering in Saudi Arabia on Saturday but has received no indication whether he will meet US President Donald Trump there, Sudan’s foreign minister said on Wednesday.

Bashir is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and is shunned by Western leaders, so any direct contact would be a diplomatic bombshell, despite thawing relations between Washington and Khartoum in recent months.

Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia on Saturday is the first stop on his maiden international trip as president that will also take him to Israel and Europe.

“On the question of the TrumpBashir handshake, nobody can pretend anything, but anyway, President Bashir has been invited by the Saudis to be in that conference,” Sudanese Foreign Minister Ibrahim Ghandour told reporters in Geneva.

ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has called on all states to help with Bashir’s arrest and urged the UN Security Council to take “robust and concrete measures” to ensure they do. - Reuters.