Air Force, Navy On Standby: India’s Plan To Evacuate Its Citizens From Sudan

India is actively looking for ways to get its people stuck in areas with a lot of fighting to better places in Sudan by land.

On April 15, fighting broke out in Khartoum and other parts of Sudan between supporters of army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who used to be his deputy but is now his foe. Daglo is in charge of the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

The once-close friends took power in a coup in 2021, but they later fought bitterly over who should be in charge.

Since the airport isn’t working in Khartoum, where the fighting is the worst, safe land paths are being looked into. The land routes will be used first to get them to safer places, which is the top concern.

The people who work at the Indian Embassy will stay put for now so they can organize and help with the operation, the sources said.

The government said that the Indian Embassy in Sudan is in touch with more than just the Sudanese government. It is also in touch with the UN, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and the United States. It said that it is working with other groups to make sure that Indians who are stuck in Sudan and want to leave can do so safely.

“As part of our planning and in order to move quickly, the Indian government is looking into a number of choices. Two C-130J planes from the Indian Air Force are waiting in Jeddah. “The INS Sumedha has arrived at Port Sudan,” the government said in a release.

In an operation run by the Department of Defense, the US has briefly shut down its embassy in Khartoum and sent all of its staff home.

Ambassador Bass, who is the Under Secretary for Management, said, “You may have seen claims on social media in the last few hours that the Rapid Security Forces worked with us and helped with this operation. That wasn’t what happened. They helped out in the sense that they didn’t shoot at our service men while the operation was going on. I would say that’s in their own best interest as much as anything else.”

In the first known civilian flight, more than 150 people from different countries arrived in Saudi Arabia the day before. It had people from 12 other countries, like India, who were not from Saudi Arabia. The three Indians who were taken away by Saudi Arabia were staff members of a Saudi airline that was shot at when fighting broke out on the ground last week.

Foreign countries say they are getting ready for the possible evacuation of thousands more of their own citizens. South Korea and Japan have sent troops to countries close, and the European Union is considering doing the same.

In Khartoum, a city of 5 million people, the war has scared civilians so much that they are hiding inside their homes. Most of the city’s power is out, and most people don’t have access to the internet.

The UN World Health Organization said that more than 420 people had died and more than 3,700 had been hurt in the fighting in Sudan, but it is thought that the real number of deaths is higher.