Sudan rejects US request to send in Marines to protect embassy in Khartoum

Sudan rejected on Saturday a United States request to send in a platoon of Marines to beef up security at its embassy in Khartoum, the state news agency SUNA stated.

“Sudan is able to protect the diplomatic missions in Khartoum and the state is committed to protecting its guests in the diplomatic corps,” Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti told SUNA.

On Friday, a US official said a Marine response team was headed to Sudan in the wake of violence and protests against the embassy that, for security reasons, is located right outside the country’s capital. The news of the deployment came as Sudanese police opened fire on protesters trying to climb the walls of the US Embassy. The protesters also stormed German and British embassies there.

At least two people were killed in clashes with police, state media reported.

The Marine unit, known as a fleet antiterrorism security team, was to be sent to Sudan in response to Friday’s violence and as a precautionary measure, as waves of attacks roiled the Muslim world over a film critical of Islam.

Similar teams were dispatched to Libya Wednesday after the fatal attack that killed the US ambassador and three other Americans there, and to Yemen on Friday in response to violence in Sanaa.