Foreign Office accused of abandoning civilians in Sudan and failing to learn from disastrous evacuation of Kabul
Britain is lagging behind other European countries, such as Spain and Italy, which have evacuated all their citizens from Sudan.
It comes after the Foreign Office was accused of abandoning British civilians in Sudan and failing to learn from the experience of the disastrous evacuation of Kabul.
Special forces evacuated about 30 embassy staff and their families, but not all British nationals, from Khartoum on Sunday. The diplomats were at risk of imminent attack, and will now draw up plans for a larger evacuation from Cyprus.
Alicia Kearns, the Tory chairman of the foreign affairs select committee, said she was “uncomfortable” that diplomats had been evacuated first.
When it was put to her that their exit could remove any restraint exercised by the warring parties, she told the Today programme: “So I can’t say I don’t disagree with that.
“The reality is, though, that every country as I understand it did remove their diplomats because they assess the situation to be so severe, the risk to those individuals’ lives, and the country does have an obligation to our diplomats. But we have to get our people out.”
Andrew Mitchell, the Foreign Office minister, told Sky News: “We will do everything we can – and I mean everything – to get our British citizens out. Our intention always has been to facilitate the exit of our own citizens as soon as it is safe to do so.”
Mr Mitchell could not say when that might happen, but stressed that “every single option is being explored in detail”.
Asked why diplomats, but not citizens, had been evacuated, he said that “we have a specific duty of care, a legal duty of care, to our own staff and our diplomats” and that there had been “a very specific threat to the diplomatic community” in Khartoum.
Tobias Ellwood, the chairman of the Commons defence committee, told GB News: “What we require is a clear-cut plan as to how to get British passport holders out. If that plan does not emerge today, then individuals will then lose faith and then start making their own way back.”
He warned that outcome could lead to “some very difficult situations”.
Spain’s air force helped all Spanish nationals wanting to leave to escape Sudan, which is riven by fierce fighting between rival factions.
Some 30 Spaniards were among around 100 people evacuated, with the other nationalities being citizens of Portugal, Italy, Poland, Ireland, Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina and Sudan. The military operation involved a transport plane and security convoy.
Guido Crosetto, Italy’s minister of defence, said all Italians in Sudan had been evacuated. Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, said: “Italy leaves no one behind.”
France is continuing to evacuate people from Sudan, with a further evacuation having been carried out on Monday morning, the French government said, adding that its operations had so far resulted in 388 people being evacuated.