Dubai ports giant DP World has hired a former Israeli intelligence official to lobby the US government for support in its bid to operate Sudan’s largest port terminal.

The firm signed a $5 million contract — of which $1.5 million was paid up front — with Ari Ben-Menashe and his Montreal-based Dickens & Madson firm in November to lobby Sudan for a 20-year concession with the South Port Container Terminal in Port Sudan, according to newly disclosed lobbying filings. The contract also calls on Dickens & Madson to lobby the Donald Trump administration for a grant to help “maintain and develop” the port, which handles most Sudanese imports.

Ben-Menashe told Al-Monitor that he has developed deep connections with Sudanese officials thanks to a controversial lobbying deal with Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the country’s former de facto military ruler. That $6 million contract with the internationally sanctioned country, signed in May 2019, has triggered investigations by both Canada and the United Nations.

Sudan struck a $2.4 billion deal on Port Sudan with a Philippine port operator under then-President Omar al-Bashir. But the transitional military council led by Dagalo scrapped the agreement in April 2019 after deposing Bashir.