Sudanese military officials said Saturday they are coordinating the evacuation of foreign diplomats and citizens of various countries,?as the US embassy in Khartoum ordered Americans to shelter in place?amid the country’s continued descent into a bloody civil war.
At least one American has been killed in the conflict, the State Department said Friday, although it did not identify the victim.
On Saturday, the?African country’s military leader, Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan?said he?had spoken to leaders of several foreign countries, including Britain, China and France, who have requested safe evacuations of their citizens and diplomats from Sudan, even as most major airports have turned into battlegrounds between the Sudanese military and a rival paramilitary group.
Burhan “agreed to provide the necessary assistance to secure such evacuations for various countries,” a military spokesman said.
But it’s not clear how the rescues will take place as fighting engulfed the capital Khartoum over the past week, shutting down the main international airport and forcing millions of residents to shelter in their homes, with many running short of food and other supplies.
“We share the international community’s concern about foreign nationals,” Burhan told a Saudi TV station Saturday. “Living conditions are deteriorating.”
“It is not currently safe to undertake a U.S. government co-ordinated evacuation of private U.S. citizens,” an alert from the US embassy said, adding that there was “incomplete information” about convoys evacuating civilians out of the war-ravaged capital city.
Burhan said that some diplomats from Saudi Arabia had already been evacuated for Port Sudan, on the Red Sea and more than 500 miles from the capital. He said diplomats from Jordan would soon be evacuated in the same way.
Earlier this week, US officials at the Pentagon said that they were sending troops and equipment to a Naval base to Djibouti in the Gulf of Aden to help prepare for the evacuation of US embassy workers. But the White House said that it did not have plans for the evacuation of 16,000 American citizens who are trapped in the country.
With Post Wires
