FILE - Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi (L) meets with Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Bashir (R) in Addis Ababa on January 27, 2018- press photoCAIRO – 19 March 2018: The two Nile River neighbors, Egypt and Sudan, have common bonds of history, language and religion. But, diplomatic relations have been frosty over the past years due to various reasons. On December 23, 2017, Sudan filed a complaint to the United Nations Secretariat to protest a maritime border demarcation deal between Egypt and Saudi Arabia, as the deal denotes the territory as Egyptian on maps.Halaib and Shalateen, or the Halaib Triangle, is an area of land measuring 20,580 square kilometers, located at the Egyptian-Sudanese border on the Red Sea coast. It is part of the Red Sea governorate and consists of three major towns – Halaib (which became a city in February 2014), Abu Ramad and Shalateen.The area belongs to Egypt politically and administratively, but has been one of the major sticking points in Egyptian-Sudanese relations since the demarcation of borders between the two countries were carried out during the British occupation of Egypt in 1899, at a time when Sudan was part of the Egyptian Kingdom.The issue re-emerged after Halaib and Shalateen declared electoral constituency in both Sudan and Egypt in 2014.Egypt affirmed that it has never concluded any international treaties or agreements, whether with the U.K. or Sudan, to give international status to the demarcation of administrative borders.The largest tribes that inhabit Hala'ib Trinagle, including Rashaida, Alababdeh and Bashaira, rejected the Sudanese National Election Commission's decision that granted the people in Hala'ib the right to participate in Sudanese general elections. The three tribes asserted during the 6 October War victory celebration in 2009, that the area is 100 percent Egyptian.

Source: Egypt Today March 19, 2018 14:03 UTC