The US Department of Defense said it has deployed intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets to support air and ground evacuation routes. “We are moving naval assets into the region to provide any support needed on the coast. Our goal was, and remains, to help as many American citizens as possible leave the country safely,” the Department of Defense said in a statement.
The United States has already come under fire from families of Americans trapped in Sudan since the conflict began for warning its citizens to find their own way out of the country. Everything changed with the appearance of a relative lull in the fighting, which allowed the United States to organize a convoy for the Americans.
On April 22, US Special Forces briefly flew to the capital, Khartoum, to airlift US Embassy personnel and other members of the US government. More than a dozen other countries are already evacuating their citizens using military planes and ships.
A large group of international mediators – including African and Arab countries, the UN and the United States – managed only a temporary ceasefire, which nevertheless failed to completely stop the clashes. The relative calm allowed tens of thousands of Sudanese to flee to safer areas and foreign countries to evacuate thousands of their citizens by land, air and sea.
With no evacuation flights from the capital, many US citizens have been forced to make the dangerous overland journey from Khartoum to Port Sudan, the country’s main port on the Red Sea. According to the Associated Press, a Sudanese American family who made the trip said they passed through numerous checkpoints lined with armed men and passed the bodies and vehicles of other refugees lying on the streets and killed along the way. .
“We reiterate our warning to Americans not to travel to Sudan,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said.
From Port Sudan, far from the fighting, the Americans could cross the Red Sea to the Saudi port city of Jeddah. US officials are also working with Saudi Arabia to see if one of the kingdom’s warships can bring more Americans to Jeddah.
At the moment, the deaths of two Americans during the fighting in Sudan have been officially confirmed. One was caught in the crossfire and another was stabbed to death in front of his family in Khartoum in the violence that accompanied the fighting.
In total, more than 500 people have died as a result of hostilities in the East African country.
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