India has evacuated more than 530 of its citizens from Sudan using military aircraft and a warship, and more are set to be taken out of the northeast African country amid a lull in fighting between the regular army and a rebel paramilitary force.
The evacuation began on Tuesday after forces loyal to the Sudan Army chief, Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and his deputy-turned-rival, Gen Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who heads the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), agreed on a 72-hour nationwide ceasefire.
The first batch of 278 Indians were ferried by INS Sumedha from Port Sudan, the country’s main port located more than 800 km from the capital Khartoum, to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.
Under Operation Kaveri, two more batches comprising 121 people and 135 people were flown in C-130J medium-lift transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) from Port Sudan to Jeddah. India had positioned two C-130J aircraft in Jeddah on Sunday.
Minister of state for external affairs V Muraleedharan, who travelled to Jeddah on Tuesday to oversee repatriation efforts, received the Indians when they arrived in the Saudi port city. “Onward journey to India for all who arrived in Jeddah will commence shortly,” he said in a tweet.
Most of the Indian nationals who had gathered in Port Sudan till Tuesday have now been evacuated to Saudi Arabia, though people familiar with the matter said there were still problems in evacuating hundreds stranded in Khartoum, where the main airport has been damaged in recent fighting.
Indian authorities are exploring various options for evacuating stranded Indian nationals from Khartoum and other locations, including the use of military airbases located near the capital city.
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