Khartoum: Sudan’s foreign ministry said on Thursday it had summoned the Libyan ambassador in Khartoum to protest against the arrest of a Sudanese consul in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi.
Libyan security officials in Benghazi denied Abdul Halim Omair had been detained, and an official in Libyan Prime Minister Abdullah Al Thinni’s office said he had no information about the alleged incident.
Relations between the two governments soured in September when Al Thinni, Libya’s internationally recognised leader, accused Khartoum of trying to airlift weapons and ammunition to a rival government in Tripoli.
Khartoum denies the charge, saying the weapons were meant for a joint border force under a bilateral agreement.
Sudanese foreign ministry spokesman Ali Al Sadiq said the ministry had summoned the Libyan ambassador on Wednesday and was contacting Libyan authorities to secure the consul’s release.
“They promised they will do that soon,” he said.
In January, the official Libyan government banned Sudanese citizens, Syrians and Palestinians from entering the war-torn nation, accusing their countries of undermining Libya’s security.
The conflict is intensifying in Libya, where two rival governments, each backed by loose coalitions of ex-rebels who once fought together to oust Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, are battling for control of the Opec producer.
Al Thinni’s government was forced to relocate to Tobruk in the east after Islamist-leaning militias captured Tripoli in August.