US military prepares options for possible Sudan evacuation

The US military is preparing options to evacuate the US Embassy in Sudan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Friday as the Biden administration weighed whether to pull personnel out of the country's increasingly unstable capital.

"We've deployed some forces into theater to ensure that we provide as many options as possible if we are called on to do something. And we haven't been called on to do anything yet," Austin told a news conference at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. "No decision on anything has been made."

According to Press TV, two US officials said a decision on a possible evacuation of the embassy is expected soon, but it was unclear if there will be a public announcement.

Forces commanded by two previously allied leaders of Sudan's ruling council began a violent power struggle last weekend. Hundreds have died so far and a nation reliant on food aid has been tipped into what the United Nations calls a humanitarian catastrophe.

John Kirby, the White House National Security Spokesperson, said President Joe Biden approved a plan this week to move US forces nearby in case they are needed to help evacuate American diplomats.

"We are simply pre-positioning some additional capabilities nearby in case that they're needed," Kirby told reporters.

With the airport in Khartoum caught in the fighting and the skies unsafe, nations including the United States, Japan, South Korea, Germany and Spain have been unable to evacuate embassy staff.

A Western diplomat said the evacuation situation in Sudan is one of the most difficult they have seen, with Americans likely focused on getting a ceasefire and using that to get personnel out.

"In this case, the civil war starts in the capital, fighting is exactly where the embassies are and where the airport is. It's unusually difficult," the diplomat said.

Cameron Hudson, a US Africa policy expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and former director for African affairs at the National Security Council, said the level of violence in Khartoum makes the situation for evacuation unpredictable.

Washington has said private American citizens in Sudan should have no expectation of a US government-coordinated evacuation. State Department Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel said the United States was in touch with several hundred American citizens understood to be in Sudan.

Earlier on Friday, the State Department confirmed the death of one US citizen in the country.

ME