Sudan's Bashir to miss OIC summit after EU objected

By Ibon Villelabeitia

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir pulled out of an Islamic summit in Istanbul on Sunday -- a trip that the European Union had objected to because of his indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) .

Bashir, against whom the ICC has issued an arrest warrant for crimes against humanity in Sudan's Darfur region, had announced plans to attend a meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) on Monday.

Sudan's state news agency Suna reported that Bashir had postponed his trip to return to Khartoum to discuss a deadlock over election laws with his coalition partners, the former southern rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement.

Turkey, which has deepened economic ties with Sudan, has not ratified the statute that established the ICC and had said it had no plans to arrest Bashir.

But the mainly Muslim country, which is seeking EU membership, had come under pressure from Brussels to drop Bashir from the guest list.

International Crisis Group analyst Fouad Hikmat said the decision showed how much the ICC warrant had hindered Bashir's movements.

"I don't think he'll be able to venture out beyond the immediate neighbourhood, or maybe the Gulf. His people don't want to take any risks. Once he's in international airspace, he is in no man's land," he told Reuters.

Earlier, in comments reported by the state-run Anatolian news agency, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan had denied that Bashir was responsible for genocide in Darfur and said he would be more comfortable talking to Bashir than to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.