The US military is preparing options to evacuate the US embassy in Sudan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said, as the Biden administration weighed whether to move staff out of the country’s increasingly volatile capital.
“We have some forces deployed to the scene to make sure we provide as many options as possible if we are asked to do something. And we haven’t been asked to do anything yet,” Austin said from the Ramstein Air base in Germany. “No decision has been made on anything.”
Two US officials said a decision on a possible evacuation of the embassy was expected soon, but it was not clear if there would be a public announcement.
Forces led by two leaders previously allied with Sudan’s ruling council began a violent power struggle last weekend. Hundreds have died so far and the nation, which is dependent on food aid, has been engulfed in what the United Nations calls a humanitarian catastrophe.
John Kirby, the White House national security spokesman, said President Joe Biden approved a plan this week to bring US forces nearby in case they are needed to help evacuate US diplomats.
“We’re just prepositioning some additional capabilities nearby in case they’re needed,” Kirby told reporters.
Khartoum airport is caught in the fighting and the skies unsafe. A Western diplomat said the evacuation situation in Sudan is one of the most difficult they have seen, with the Americans likely focused on achieving a ceasefire and using it to get personnel out.
Earlier on Friday, the State Department confirmed the death of a US citizen in the country.
UN works to extract personnel
Other countries and the United Nations are also looking at how they can evacuate citizens and employees.
The UN has been trying to extract personnel from “very dangerous” areas in Sudan to move them to safer locations, the UN’s top aid official in Sudan, Abdou Dieng, said on Thursday. Dieng said he had been moved to a safer area on Wednesday.
The UN has about 4,000 employees in Sudan, of whom 800 are international staff. A UN source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there were another 6,000 family members of UN staff and associated personnel in Sudan.
Spanish military planes are standing by and ready to evacuate some 60 Spanish citizens and others from Khartoum. Separately, Switzerland said on Friday it was examining ways to evacuate Sudanese citizens, and Sweden said it would evacuate embassy staff and families as soon as possible.
