UK evacuation mission from Sudan ends with more than 2,000 people brought to safety
The UK has evacuated 2,197 people to safety from war-torn Sudan, making it the longest and largest airlift by any of the Western nations during the crisis, the Foreign Office has said.
As fighting raged on Monday in the capital, Khartoum, the UK government’s airlift came to an end with two final evacuation flights from Port Sudan on the country’s eastern coast.
Attention now turns to diplomatic and humanitarian efforts as civilian casualties continue to rise amid intense fighting.
The evacuation of British nationals onto an awaiting RAF aircraft at Wadi Seidna Air Base in Khartoum, Sudan
After fighting broke out on 15 April, British diplomats were quickly evacuated in a special military operation a week later, and the government faced criticism for not evacuating British nationals as well.
After a ceasefire was agreed the RAF flew more than 20 flights and the UK deployed over 1,000 personnel to evacuate British nationals, as well as Sudanese doctors and those of other nationalities who work as clinicians within the NHS, and their dependents, Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said.
In total, the UK has evacuated 1,087 people from other nations, including the US, Ireland, Netherlands, Canada, Germany and Australia.
Those numbers are expected to be updated tomorrow after the final flights land in Cyprus.
Read more:
‘Death will come to you anywhere’ – mayhem at Port Sudan
Traumatised Sudan evacuees describe ‘horrendous’ scenes
Explainer: What’s behind the Sudan fighting?
On Saturday, the UK stopped evacuation flights from an airfield north of the capital, Khartoum, due to what the government said was a “significant decline” in the number of Britons coming forward, and an “increasingly volatile” situation on the ground.
The evacuation operation then moved to Port Sudan where a UK team was set up to provide consular assistance to any remaining British nationals. The Royal Navy ship HMS Lancaster was also deployed to the port to assist in the evacuation efforts.
British Consular Support Centre at the Coral Hotel
In a statement, Foreign Secretary James Cleverly hailed the “extraordinary” efforts of the UK evacuation teams, and added: “As the focus turns to humanitarian and diplomatic efforts, we will continue to do all we can to press for a long-term ceasefire and an immediate end to the violence in Sudan.”
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace added that the British armed forces had “led the way” in evacuating nationals.
“In one week, the RAF has flown more than 20 flights, deployed over a thousand personnel, evacuated over 2,000 civilians and helped citizens from more than 20 countries to get home,” he said.
“HMS Lancaster will remain at Port Sudan and her crew will continue to help provide support.”
The attention of UK teams now turns to diplomacy and humanitarian aid.
Smoke rises above buildings after an aerial bombardment, during clashes between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the army in Khartoum North, Sudan
International Development Minister Andrew Mitchell has spent the weekend in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, to meet with Kenyan President William Samoei Ruto and African Union Chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat to discuss the conflict.
Meanwhile, the UK’s ambassador to Sudan – who faced criticism for not being in the country when the fighting broke out – has been deployed to Addis Ababa to work on the UK’s response from the British Embassy in Ethiopia.
The civilian death toll has risen upwards of 411 and the number of injured to more than 2,023, according to the Sudan Doctors’ Syndicate, which measures casualties.
UK officials and medics are meeting the evacuees at an airport in Cyprus
More than 50,000 Sudanese refugees – mostly women and children – have crossed over into Chad, Egypt, South Sudan and the Central African Republic since the crisis began, the United Nations said.
The UK government has urged British nationals who remain in Sudan to continue to follow the government’s travel advice, saying that the situation remains “volatile”.
Consular assistance remains available at Port Sudan, which has become the country’s de-facto administrative capital as fighting rages in Khartoum.
Zoe Ball is leaving her BBC Radio 2 breakfast show after six years.
The 53-year-old, who recently lost her mother to cancer, will present her last show on Friday, 20 December.
Ball leaves Wogan House with her replacement, Scott Mills. Pic: PA
She said she was leaving to focus on family, but will remain part of the Radio 2 team and will give further details next year.
Announcing the news on her Tuesday show, she said: “After six years of fun times alongside you all on the breakfast show, I’ve decided it’s time to step away from the early alarm call and start a new chapter.
“You know I think the world of you all, listeners, and it truly has been such a privilege to share the mornings with you, to go through life’s little ups and downs, we got through the lockdown together, didn’t we?
“We’ve shared a hell of a lot, the good times, the tough times, there’s been a lot of laughter. And I am going to miss you cats.”
Scott Mills will replace Ball on the breakfast show following her departure next month.
“Zoe and I have been such good friends now for over 25 years and have spent much of that time as part of the same radio family here at Radio 2 and also on Radio 1,” he said.
“She’s done an incredible job on this show over the past six years, and I am beyond excited to be handed the baton.”
Hugging outside the BBC building on the day of the announcement, Ball said she was “really chuffed for my mate and really excited about it”.
Ball was the first female host of both the BBC Radio 1 and Radio 2 breakfast shows, starting at the Radio 1 breakfast show in 1998, and taking over her current Radio 2 role from Chris Evans in 2020 after he left the show.
She took a break from hosting her show over the summer, returning in September.
Ahead of her stint in radio, Ball – who is the daughter of children’s presenter Johnny Ball – co-hosted the BBC’s Saturday morning children’s magazine show Live & Kicking alongside Jamie Theakston for three years from 1996.
She has two children, Woody and Nelly, with her ex-husband, DJ and musician Norman Cook, known professionally as Fatboy Slim.
Ball said in her announcement her last show towards the end of December will be “just in time for Christmas with plenty of fun and shenanigans”.
“While I’m stepping away from the Breakfast Show, I’m not disappearing entirely – I’ll still be a part of the Radio 2 family, with more news in the New Year,” she added.
“I’m excited to embrace my next chapter, including being a mum in the mornings, and I can’t wait to tune in on the school run!”
Helen Thomas, head of Radio 2, said: “Zoe has woken up the nation on Radio 2 with incredible warmth, wit and so much joy since January 2019, and I’d like to thank her for approaching each show with as much vim and vigour as if it were her first. I’m thrilled that she’ll remain an important part of the Radio 2 family.”
Mills, 51, got his first presenting role aged just 16 for a local station in Hampshire, and went on to present in Bristol and Manchester, before joining BBC Radio 1 in 1998.
He’s previously worked as a cover presenter on Radio 2, but this is his first permanent role on the station.
UK
More prisoners are being transferred to less secure jails to tackle overcrowding crisis, Sky News understands
The prison service is starting to recategorise the security risk of offenders to ease capacity pressures, Sky News understands.
It involves lowering or reconsidering the threshold of certain offenders to move them from the closed prison estate (category A to C) to the open estate (category D) because there are more free cell spaces there.
Examples of this could include discounting adjudications – formal hearings when a prisoner is accused of breaking the rules – for certain offenders, so they don’t act as official reasons not to transport them to a lower-security jail.
Prisoners are also categorised according to an Incentives and Earned Privileges (IEP) status. There are different levels – basic, standard and enhanced – based on how they keep to the rules or display a commitment to rehabilitation.
Usually ‘enhanced’ prisoners take part in meaningful activity – employment and training – making them eligible among other factors, to be transferred to the open estate.
Insiders suggest this system in England and Wales is being rejigged so that greater numbers of ‘standard’ prisoners can transfer, whereas before it would more typically be those with ‘enhanced’ status.
Open prisons have minimal security and allow eligible prisoners to spend time on day release away from the prison on license conditions to carry out work or education.
The aim is to help reintegrate them back into society once they leave. As offenders near the end of their sentence, they are housed in open prisons.
Many of those released as part of the early release scheme in October after serving 40% of their sentence were freed from open prisons.
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Overcrowding in UK prisons
They were the second tranche of offenders freed as part of this scheme, and had been sentenced to five years or more.
Despite early release measures, prisons are still battling a chronic overcrowding crisis. The male estate is almost full, operating at around 97% capacity.
Read more from Sky News:
Find out what it’s really like inside prison?
Prison recalls soar as justice system struggles
Campaigners demand IPP sentences are scrapped
Sky News understands there continue to be particular pinch points across the country.
Southwest England struggled over the weekend with three space-related ‘lockouts’ – which means prisoners are held in police suites or transferred to other jails because there is no space.
One inmate is believed to have been transported from Exeter to Cardiff.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The new government inherited a prison system on the point of collapse. We took the necessary action to stop our prisons from overflowing and to protect the public.
“This is not a new scheme. Only less-serious offenders who meet a strict criteria are eligible, and the Prison Service can exclude anyone who can’t be managed safely in a category D prison.”
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