The US will remove Sudan from its list of state sponsors of terrorism, President Donald Trump says, if the poor northeast African nation pays hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation to US victims of terrorist attacks.
The US had reportedly indicated it would remove Sudan from the list if the country's new post-coup government agreed to recognise Israel, after the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain formalised diplomatic ties last month.
However Trump made no mention of Israel on Monday, saying only that Khartoum had agreed to pay $US335 million ($A473 million) to US victims of terrorist attacks.
Once the money was paid, Sudan would get off the notorious list.
The terror designation has had major economic disadvantages for the poverty-stricken state that depends on oil exports.
"Thank you so much, President Trump! We very much look forward to your official notification to Congress rescinding the designation of Sudan as a state-sponsor of terrorism, which has cost Sudan too much," the prime minister of Sudan's transitional government, Abdalla Hamdok, tweeted.
"As we're about to get rid of the heaviest legacy of Sudan's previous, defunct regime, I should reiterate that we are peace-loving people and have never supported terrorism," he added.
In August, Hamdok told visiting US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that as head of the new transitional government he did not have "a mandate" to decide whether to normalise ties with the Jewish state.
Located in the Horn of Africa, Sudan - like many other Arab countries - has no diplomatic relations with Israel.
Sudan's terror listing stemmed from the behaviour of the previous regime in Khartoum, which was overthrown in a coup that followed mass protests in 2019.
Former president Omar al-Bashir is facing a trial at home over the military coup that brought him to power and is also wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes.
Osama bin Laden at points in the 1990s lived in Sudan and Khartoum was accused of aiding Palestinian militant groups and Lebanon's Hezbollah.
US courts have said Khartoum was complicit in the al-Qaeda bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.
Australian Associated Press
