Sudan crisis: Which countries have evacuated their citizens from Sudan amid criticism of UK’s evacuation plans
As foreign countries evacuate hundreds of their citizens from the escalating violence in Sudan, the UK government has been accused of not doing enough to extract its own nationals.
The conflict has killed 420 people and trapped millions of Sudanese citizens without access to basic services.
Elite British troops were involved in a covert mission to evacuate British diplomats and their families from the capital Khartoum under cover of darkness, Sky News revealed.
But the UK government has faced criticism over the level of assistance it is providing for the 4,000 or so other UK passport holders still in the country.
So what are other countries doing to rescue their citizens from the crisis?
The US
US special forces evacuated all US government personnel and their dependants from their embassy on Saturday using helicopters that flew from a base in Djibouti and refuelled in Ethiopia.
Washington reportedly is not planning to coordinate an evacuation of other Americans but is looking at options to help them leave.
France
Meanwhile, a French plane carrying around 100 people left Khartoum on Sunday for Djibouti with a second plane carrying a similar number also expected to take off, France said. Operations resumed on Monday.
The plane also carried the European Union delegation along with some other nationalities.
The two warring factions – the army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group – each accused the other of attacking a French convoy.
Other EU countries
The Irish government also confirmed it is sending in a team to evacuate its citizens from the crisis.
Germany’s air force has also been involved in evacuations, extracting a total of 313 people from Sudan so far.
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Sky News’s Deborah Haynes reveals how elite team of British troops evacuated UK diplomats from Sudan’s warzone capital
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Calls for Britons including NHS doctors to be helped
‘We need to get out’
An Italian air force C-130 that departed from Khartoum with evacuees landed on Sunday night at an air base in Djibouti, the defence ministry said. It added that another plane, carrying Italy’s ambassador and military personnel involved in the evacuation, was expected in Djibouti later in the night.
Spanish military aircraft flew out around 100 people out of Khartoum, including more than 30 Spaniards and the rest from Portugal, Italy, Poland, Ireland, Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia and Argentina, the foreign ministry said.
Sweden and Norway have said they were each involved in efforts to evacuate citizens.
Switzerland
Switzerland says it has closed its embassy in Khartoum and transported staff and their families out.
“This was made possible thanks to a collaboration with our partners, in particular France,” the Swiss foreign ministry said on Twitter.
Citizens of Saudi Arabia and people from other nationalities are welcomed by Saudi Royal Navy officials as they arrive in Jeddah
Middle Eastern countries
Saudi Arabia took 91 Saudis and about 66 people from other countries out from Port Sudan by naval ship to the Suadi port of Jeddah, across the Red Sea.
Qatar thanked Saudi Arabia for helping evacuate Qatari citizens. Sudan’s army accused the RSF of attacking and looting a Qatari embassy convoy heading to Port Sudan. It was not clear if it was the same group that left for Saudi Arabia.
Kuwait said all citizens wishing to return home had arrived in Jeddah.
Egypt says it had around 10,000 nationals in neighbouring Sudan, 436 of whom had been evacuated.
Jordan officials said four planes landed at Amman military airport carrying 343 evacuees from Port Sudan.
Lebanon said it was working to evacuate 51 citizens from Port Sudan.
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Foreign Secretary James Cleverly says the government is committed’ to helping Brits in Sudan
Russia
Russia’s ambassador in Khartoum told state media that 140 out of roughly 300 Russians in Sudan had said they wanted to leave.
Evacuation plans were made but were still impossible to implement because they involve crossing frontlines, the ambassador said.
He added there were about 15 people, including a woman and child, stuck in a Russian Orthodox church close to heavy fighting in Khartoum.
Other countries
Around 83 Libyans including diplomats and their families, students and airline and bank employees had reached Port Sudan for onward travel home, according to Libya’s embassy in Khartoum.
South Korea said last week it was sending a military aircraft to evacuate its 25 citizens in Sudan.
Japan said three planes had landed in Djibouti to transport Japanese nationals.
Ghana and Kenya said they were working to help their nationals get out, while Nigeria said had asked for a safe corridor to evacuate 5,500 nationals, mostly students.
World
Trump doubles down on Putin criticism – as Russia offers Ukraine a date and location for peace talks
Donald Trump has doubled down on his criticism of Vladimir Putin – adding he will know soon if the Russian leader is just “tapping” him along.
The US president told reporters at the White House that he believed his counterpart in Moscow may be intentionally delaying ceasefire talks, while he also expressed disappointment at heavy Russian bombing over the weekend.
While Mr Trump has so far stopped short of imposing sanctions – to avoid, he says, “screwing up” negotiations – he warned his stance could change.
Ukraine Q&A: Are we any closer to war ending?
The president said: “We’re going to find out whether or not he’s tapping us along or not, and if he is, we’ll respond a little differently,” adding that he “can’t tell you” if Mr Putin wanted peace.
Donald Trump. Pic: Reuters
His comments in the Oval Office came minutes after Russia’s foreign minister announced that the Kremlin had offered Ukraine a second round of talks on 2 June in Istanbul.
Kyiv did not immediately respond to the proposal, which Sergei Lavrov said would see Moscow hand their proposals for a potential peace deal directly to Ukraine.
“We hope that all those who are sincerely, and not just in words, interested in the success of the peace process will support holding a new round of direct Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul,” Mr Lavrov added.
Later on Wednesday, Ukraine’s defence minister Rustem Umerov said his government was “not against” further meetings, but called for Russia to deliver its memorandum to Kyiv beforehand.
Meanwhile, Mr Lavrov also hit out at Germany for agreeing to finance the production of long-range missiles in Ukraine, accusing Berlin of showing it is “already a participant in the war”.
However, German leader Friedrich Merz declined to say that his country would hand over the Taurus missiles that Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy – who was in Berlin on Wednesday – has long wanted.
Ukraine’s need for ammunition has become all the more urgent after Russia launched some of the largest aerial assaults of the war so far over the weekend.
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Russia said it had downed 296 Ukrainian drones over 13 regions overnight, while Ukraine said it had struck several weapon production sites.
Kyiv, in turn, said Moscow had launched 88 drones and five ballistic missiles since Tuesday.
World
Hamas’s Gaza chief ‘eliminated’, says Netanyahu – but military sources say they cannot confirm death
Hamas’s Gaza chief Mohammed Sinwar has been “eliminated”, according to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But Israeli military sources have said they are not yet able to confirm the death.
Hamas has also not yet confirmed the apparent killing of its leader.
Meanwhile, with Gaza on the brink of famine, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Nations broke down in tears as he spoke of the suffering of its people.
Palestinian ambassador Riyad Mansour broke down in tears as he spoke of the suffering of people in Gaza
Riyah Mansour told the Security Council: “Children are dying of starvation. The images of mothers embracing their motionless bodies. Caressing their hair, talking to them, apologising to them, is unbearable.”
He added: “I have grandchildren. I know what they mean to their families. And to see this situation over the Palestinians without us having hearts to do something is beyond the ability of any normal human being to tolerate. Flames and hunger are devouring Palestinian children. This is why we are so outraged as Palestinians everywhere.”
Sinwar was one of Israel‘s most wanted and the younger brother of the Palestinian militant group’s former leader Yahya Sinwar.
The older sibling was the mastermind of the October 7 2023 attack, which killed 1,200 people in Israel, with around 250 others taken hostage into Gaza.
The attack triggered Israel’s assault on Gaza which decimated the territory, with more than 53,000 people killed, mostly women and children, and over two million displaced, according to health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants in their tally of fatalities.
Yahya Sinwar was killed by Israel in October 2024. File pic: AP
Yahya Sinwar was killed in a gun battle with Israeli troops in Gaza last October. His younger sibling was believed to have then become the head of Hamas’s armed wing.
Speaking to the Knesset on Wednesday, Mr Netanyahu included Mohammed Sinwar in a list of Hamas leaders killed in Israeli strikes. Later, Israel Defence Forces (IDF) sources said they were not yet able to confirm the death.
The prime minister said: “We have killed tens of thousands of terrorists. We killed (Mohammed) Deif, (Ismail) Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Sinwar.” He did not elaborate.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s claimed could not be confirmed. Pic: AP
Mohammed Sinwar had reportedly been the target of an Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza on 13 May and Mr Netanyahu said on 21 May that it was likely he had been killed.
The Israeli military had said it struck a Hamas command centre under the European Hospital in the Sinwars’ hometown of Khan Younis, and it declined to comment on whether Sinwar was targeted or killed.
At least six people were killed in the strike and 40 wounded, Gaza’s health ministry said at the time.
Sinwar rose through ranks
Like his older brother, Mohammed Sinwar joined Hamas after it was founded in the late 1980s as the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. He became a member of the group’s military wing, known as the Qassam Brigades.
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Sinwar rose through the ranks to become a member of its so-called joint chiefs of staff, bringing him close to its longtime commander, Deif, who was killed in a strike last year.
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Humanitarian chief talks of Gaza ‘catastrophe’
UN boss condemns ‘teaspoon’ of aid allowed into Gaza
“In the last two days, we have been in a dramatic turn towards a complete defeat of Hamas,” the Israeli leader told the Knesset.
Mr Netanyahu also spoke about how Israel was “taking control of food distribution”, a reference to a new aid distribution system that has been criticised and boycotted by humanitarian groups and the UN.
One killed at site of aid hub
The development comes after one person was killed and 48 others injured when forces opened fire on a crowd that overwhelmed an aid hub in Gaza, according to local health officials.
Palestinians have become increasingly desperate for food after almost three months of Israeli border closures. A blockade has recently been eased.
People broke through fences around the distribution site on Wednesday, and a journalist with the Associated Press said they heard Israeli tank and gunfire, and saw a military helicopter firing flares.
It was not yet known whether the death and injuries were caused by Israeli forces, private contractors or others.
The Israeli and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which set up the hub outside Rafah, said its military contractors had not fired on the crowd but “fell back” before resuming aid operations. Israel said its troops nearby had fired warning shots.
The UN and other humanitarian organisations have rejected the new system, saying it will not meet the needs of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and allows Israel to use food to control the population.
Israel has vowed to seize control of Gaza and fight until Hamas is destroyed or disarmed and exiled, and until the militant group returns the last 58 hostages, including around a third thought to be still alive.
‘This is a man-made catastrophe’
Meanwhile, a US trauma surgeon who has been working in Gaza urged the UN Security Council to not “claim ignorance” about the humanitarian devastation.
Dr Feroze Sidhwa said: “Let’s not forget, this is a man-made catastrophe. It is entirely preventable. Participating in it or not allowing it to happen is a choice.
“This is a deliberate denial of conditions necessary for life: food, shelter, water and medicine. Preventing genocide means refusing to normalise these atrocities.”
The UN World Health Organization has documented around 700 attacks on healthcare facilities in Gaza during the war. Israel accuses Hamas of using hospitals as command centres and to hide fighters.
Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan Tate have been charged with rape and other offences in the UK.
Andrew Tate, 38, faces 10 charges, including rape, actual bodily harm, human trafficking and controlling prostitution for gain, relating to three women.
His brother Tristan Tate, 36, faces 11 charges relating to one woman – including rape, actual bodily harm and human trafficking.
The charges were authorised in January 2024, but full details have only been released now.
Bedfordshire Police issued an international arrest warrant for the brothers over allegations, which they “unequivocally deny”, said to have occurred between 2012 and 2015.
The Tate brothers are facing separate allegations of trafficking minors, sexual intercourse with a minor and money laundering in Romania.
They are also accused of human trafficking and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women in a different case, which has been sent back to prosecutors.
They are due to be extradited to the UK following the conclusion of proceedings in Romania.
Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan outside a Bucharest court in January. File pic: Inquam Photos/Octav Ganea via Reuters
A Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) spokesperson said: “We can confirm that we have authorised charges against Andrew and Tristan Tate for offences including rape, human trafficking, controlling prostitution and actual bodily harm against three women.
“These charging decisions followed receipt of a file of evidence from Bedfordshire Police.
“A European Arrest Warrant was issued in England in 2024, and as a result the Romanian courts ordered the extradition to the UK of Andrew and Tristan Tate.”
The spokesperson added: “However, the domestic criminal matters in Romania must be settled first.
“The Crown Prosecution Service reminds everyone that criminal proceedings are active, and the defendants have the right to a fair trial.
“It is extremely important that there be no reporting, commentary or sharing of information online which could in any way prejudice these proceedings.”
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Representatives for Andrew Tate have been contacted by Sky News for comment.
Lawyer Matt Jury, of McCue Jury & Partners, representing several alleged British victims of Andrew Tate, said: “We welcome the clarity from the Crown Prosecution Service that our authorities are working to ensure the Tates face justice here in the UK – they cannot be allowed to escape extradition.
“At the same time, we ask once more that CPS admit its mistake in failing to prosecute Tate when he lived in the UK and finally charge him for the rape and assault of the other three women, our clients, who originally filed criminal complaints against him as long ago as 2014 but were failed by the system.
“They deserve justice, too.”
The allegations were subject to a police investigation, which was closed in 2019.
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