Sudan: UK, US evacuate Diplomats, evacuating private citizens ‘difficult’, they say

Sudan: UK, US evacuate Diplomats, evacuating private citizens ‘difficult’, they say

A growing list of countries have evacuated diplomats and citizens from Sudan’s capital as fierce fighting continues to rage in Khartoum.

The US and UK announced on Sunday they had flown diplomats out of the country.

France, Germany, Italy and Spain have also been evacuating diplomats and other nationals.

A vicious power struggle between the regular army and a powerful paramilitary force has led to violence across Sudan for more than a week.

US authorities said they had airlifted fewer than 100 people with three Chinook helicopters on Sunday morning in a “fast and clean” operation.

The US embassy in Khartoum is now closed, and a tweet on its official feed says it is not safe enough for the government to evacuate private US citizens.

The UK government managed to airlift British diplomats and their families out of the country in what was described as a “complex and rapid” operation. Foreign Minister James Cleverly said options to evacuate the remaining British nationals in Sudan were “severely limited”.

Several other countries were conducting evacuation operations on Sunday:

French President Emmanuel Macron confirmed that a plane had arrived in Djibouti carrying French citizens and others on Sunday, while another evacuation took place on Monday, taking the number of people evacuated so far to 388, its government said.

A handful of Dutch citizens left Khartoum on the French plane, while another with people from the Netherlands on board left early on Monday morning.

Germany’s army said the first of three planes had left Sudan, bound for Jordan, with 101 people on board.

Italy and Spain have evacuated citizens – the Spanish mission included citizens from Argentina, Colombia, Ireland, Portugal, Poland, Mexico, Venezuela and Sudan.

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his government had evacuated its diplomatic staff.

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