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KHARTOUM. – Western, Arab and Asian nations raced to extract their citizens from Sudan yesterday as the UN chief warned of the risk of “a catastrophic conflagration” with wider repercussions and urged international powers to exert maximum pressure for peace.
Foreign evacuations included a 65-vehicle convoy with dozens of children among diplomats and aid workers on an 800-km, 35-hour journey in searing heat from the embattled capital Khartoum to Port Sudan on the Red Sea.
The eruption of violence between the military and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group on April 15 has killed at least 427 people, knocked out hospitals and other services and turned residential areas into war zones.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned a session of the UN Security Council in New York that the violence “risks a catastrophic conflagration within Sudan that could engulf the whole region and beyond”.
He urged the 15 Council members to use their clout to end the violence and return Sudan to the path of democratic transition after a 2021 military coup, following the fall of Islamist autocrat Omar al-Bashir to a popular uprising.
“We must all do everything within our power to pull Sudan back from the edge of the abyss … We stand with them at this terrible time,” he said, adding he had authorized temporary relocation of some UN personnel and families.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington was in close touch with Sudanese military leaders and pressing them to fully implement ceasefire deals, as well as exploring options to return a US consular presence to Sudan as soon as possible.
Israel yesterday proposed hosting rival Sudanese leaders for ceasefire talks after what it called “very promising” progress in mediation efforts led by a senior Israeli official over the past few days. It gave no further details.
Tens of thousands of people, including Sudanese and citizens from neighbouring countries, have fled in the past few days, including to Egypt, Chad and South Sudan, despite instability and difficult living conditions there.
“There is still a challenge in accessing food, there’s still a challenge accessing electricity and water and that is prompting people to move,” said Farid Aiywar, Sudan head for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent.
For those remaining in Africa’s third largest country, where UN agencies say a third of its 46 million people needed aid even before the violence, the situation was increasingly bleak.
Facing attacks, aid organisations were among those withdrawing staff and the World Food Programme has suspended its food distribution mission, one of the largest in the world.
Clean water and fuel were becoming harder to come by in Khartoum, with electricity and internet services patchy. Residents have been sharing resources.
Evacuations picked up during a partial lull in fighting between the army and the RSF, but few expected the relative slowing of army air strikes, artillery barrages, and gunbattles with the RSF in residential neighbourhoods to last once the international evacuation operations were complete.
Several nations, including Canada, France, Poland, Switzerland and the United States have halted embassy operations until further notice.
By yesterday afternoon, fighting was starting to pick up again. Air strikes and ground fighting shook Omdurman, Khartoum’s sister city on the opposite bank of the Nile river, and there were also clashes in the capital. – Reuters
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