• US embassy evacuates citizens as fighting enters second week

The National Emergency Management Agency has restated its commitment towards evacuating stranded Nigerians in Sudan.

The Director-General of the agency, Mustapha Ahmed stated this in a statement issued by the Head of its Press Unit, Manzo Ezekiel on Saturday in Abuja.

NEMA, he said, has set up a committee which was already working on all possible options of ensuring the safe return of Nigerians from the conflict-ridden Sudan, especially students in its various universities.

He said the committee was composed of professional emergency responders, search and rescue experts, who would constantly evaluate the situation and recommend the safest approach for the evacuation.

“It has become necessary to inform the public that NEMA is in constant communication with all relevant partners including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Nigerian Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan, the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission and security agencies.

“While seeking for an appropriate window of opportunity to evacuate all stranded Nigerians back home in a safe and dignified manner.

“The current emergency situation in Sudan is very complex with fighting between warring factions going on and all airports and land borders closed,” he said.

He assured Nigerians that NEMA was working assiduously with all its partners, and is constantly compiling updated information on the situation.

The clashes erupted amid an apparent power struggle between the two main factions of Sudan’s military regime.

The Sudanese armed forces are broadly loyal to Gen. Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, the country’s de facto ruler, while the para militaries of the Rapid Support Forces, a collection of militia, follow the former warlord Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti.

The power struggle has its roots in the years before a 2019 uprising that ousted the dictatorial ruler Omar Al-Bashir, who built up formidable security forces that he deliberately set against one another.

When an effort to transition to a democratic civilian-led government faltered after Bashir’s fall, an eventual showdown appeared inevitable, with diplomats in Khartoum warning in early 2022 that they feared such an outbreak of violence.

In recent weeks, tensions have risen further.

The UN said no fewer than 180 people have been killed and another 1,800 injured in three days of fighting between the rival factions in Sudan.

Meanwhile, Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces said on Sunday that it had “coordinated with” American troops to evacuate Washington’s embassy in the country, where fighting between the paramilitary group and the army entered a second week following a brief lull.

More than 150 people from various nations had already reached the safety of Saudi Arabia in the first announced evacuation of civilians.

Foreign countries have said they are preparing for the potential evacuation of thousands more of their nationals, even though Sudan’s main airport remains closed.

“The Rapid Support Forces Command has coordinated with the U.S Forces Mission consisting of 6 aircraft, for evacuating diplomats and their families on Sunday morning,” said a tweet by the heavily armed paramilitary group.

The RSF pledged “full cooperation with all diplomatic missions and providing all necessary means of protection and ensuring their safe return to their countries.”

The group previously said it was ready to “partially” open “all airports” in Sudan to evacuate foreign citizens. It was not possible to verify which airports the RSF controls.

Fighting has left hundreds dead and thousands wounded, while survivors cope with shortages of electricity and food.

On Saturday, Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry announced the “safe arrival” of 91 of its citizens along with nationals from Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Tunisia, Pakistan, India, Bulgaria, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Canada and Burkina Faso.

As the kingdom’s naval forces transported the civilians, including diplomats and international officials, across the Red Sea from Port Sudan to Jeddah, fighting resumed in Sudan’s capital Khartoum after a temporary truce saw gunfire momentarily die down on Friday, the first day of Eid al-Fitr.

Eid is normally a major celebration for Sudanese marking the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

This year is marked by fear, grief and hunger.

Earlier on Saturday, Sudan’s army said its chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan had received calls from leaders of multiple countries to “facilitate and guarantee safety for evacuating citizens and diplomatic missions.”

It noted that the evacuations were expected to begin “in the coming hours”, adding that the US, Britain, France and China were planning to airlift their nationals out of Khartoum using military planes.

Burhan told Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya TV that the army was in control of “all airports, except for Khartoum airport” and one in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur.

Urban warfare began on April 15 between forces loyal to Burhan and those of his deputy-turned-rival Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.

Daglo commands the RSF, which emerged from the Janjaweed fighters unleashed in Darfur by former strongman Omar al-Bashir, drawing accusations of war crimes.

The former allies seized power in a 2021 coup but later fell out in a bitter power struggle.

On Saturday morning, heavy gunfire, loud explosions and fighter jets were heard in many parts of the capital, according to witnesses.

The army announced Friday agreement to a three-day ceasefire.

Daglo said in a statement he had “discussed the current crisis” with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, and was “focused on the humanitarian truce, safe passages, and protecting humanitarian workers”.

Five humanitarians, including four from UN-linked agencies, have so far been killed.

Two 24-hour ceasefires announced earlier in the week were also ignored.

In Khartoum, a city of five million people, the conflict has left terrified civilians sheltering inside their homes. Many have ventured out only to get urgent food supplies — stocks of which are dwindling — or to flee the city.

While Khartoum has seen some of the fiercest battles, they have occurred across the country.

Late Friday, the army accused the RSF of attacks in the capital’s twin city of Omdurman where they released “a large number of inmates” from a prison, accusations the group denies.

Battles have raged in Darfur, where Doctors Without Borders in the city of El Fasher said their medics had been “overwhelmed” by the number of patients with gunshot wounds, many of them children.

More plans are being made to evacuate foreigners, with South Korea and Japan deploying forces to nearby countries, and the European Union weighing a similar move.

The German ministers of defence and foreign affairs held a crisis meeting Saturday on a possible evacuation after three military transport planes had to turn back Wednesday, according to the German weekly Der Spiegel.

The World Health Organisation said 413 people had been killed and 3,551 wounded in the fighting across Sudan, but the actual death toll is thought to be higher.

More than two-thirds of hospitals in Khartoum and neighbouring states are now “out of service”, and at least four hospitals in North Kordofan state were shelled, the doctors’ union said.

The World Food Programme said the violence could plunge millions more into hunger in a country where one-third of the population needs aid.

Burhan and Daglo’s dispute centred on the planned integration of the RSF into the regular army, a key condition for a deal aimed at restoring Sudan’s democratic transition after the military toppled Bashir in April 2019 following mass citizen protests.

In October 2021, Burhan and Daglo joined forces to oust a civilian government installed after Bashir’s downfall.

Daglo now says the coup was a “mistake”, while Burhan believes it was “necessary” to include more groups in politics.

NAN/AFP