KHARTOUM-Foreign countries rushed to evacuate their nationals from Sudan as deadly fighting raged into a second week between forces loyal to two rival generals. Evacuation flights were continuing early Monday, with hundreds of people flown out overnight on military aircraft.
Foreigners also fled the capital Khartoum in a long United Nations convoy, while millions of frightened residents hunkered down inside their homes, many running low on water and food.
Across the city of five million, army and paramilitary troops have fought ferocious street battles since April 15, leaving behind charred tanks, gutted buildings and looted shops.
More than 420 people have been killed and thousands wounded, according to UN figures, amid fears of wider turmoil and a humanitarian disaster in one of the world’s poorest nations. US special forces launched a rescue mission Sunday for around 100 embassy staff and their relatives, swooping in with Chinook helicopters to fly them to a military base in Djibouti.
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US forces “will remain deployed in Djibouti to protect United States personnel and others until the security situation no longer requires their presence”, President Joe Biden said Sunday in a letter to the Speaker of the House.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said UK forces had also rescued diplomats and their families while Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country had temporarily suspended its evacuation operation. “Our diplomats are safe -- they have been extracted and are working from outside the country,” Trudeau tweeted.
Germany evacuates
101 people from conflict-hit Sudan
Germany has evacuated 101 people from Sudan, where fierce fighting between rival generals has entered its second week, the army said on Sunday.
Airbus A400M carrying the evacuees “landed safely in Jordan” at around midnight local time (2100 GMT), the Bundeswehr said on Twitter.
Over 1,000 EU citizens evacuated from Sudan
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More than 1,000 European Union citizens were evacuated from conflict-hit Sudan over the weekend, the bloc’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Monday.
“It has been a complex operation and it has been a successful operation,” Borrell told journalists. Borrell said 21 diplomats from the EU’s mission in Khartoum were taken out and the EU ambassador had moved outside the capital to elsewhere in Sudan.
China evacuates some citizens from Sudan, says foreign ministry
China has evacuated the first group of its citizens from conflict-hit Sudan, Beijing’s foreign ministry said Monday.
It joins countries across the world, including in Asia, in racing to move foreign nationals to safety after the army and paramilitary forces began clashing across Sudan, killing hundreds and causing acute shortages of water, food, medicines and fuel.
China says it is Sudan’s largest trading partner, with over 130 companies investing there as of mid-2022.
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Beijing’s foreign ministry estimates more than 1,500 Chinese nationals are currently in Sudan.
The first group of Chinese citizens has been “safely evacuated”, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said on Monday, without giving a specific number.