US Citizen Dies During Military Conflict, Washington Withdraws Diplomat From Sudan

Illustration of conditions in Sudan. (Wikimedia Commons/Osama Eid)

JAKARTA - An American citizen (US) died amid a military conflict to fight over power in Sudan, US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on Friday. He did not mention the identity of the victim but expressed his condolences to the victim's family. On Thursday 20 April, the Pentagon said that the US was sending troops into the region ahead of a possible withdrawal of US diplomats from Sudan. However, Kirby said that the US had not been able to gather all of their diplomats before the evacuation process. "The process was not over yet completed, but I know the Ambassador John Right there worked very hard to check if he could speed it up," Kirby said as quoted by ANTARA, Saturday, April 22. "I think you can understand that this is not as simple as getting into the taxi and going to the embassy. This is a very dangerous situation in Khartoum as the fighting continues," he said. At least 413 people were killed and more than 3,500 injured since fighting erupted on April 15 between Sudanese soldiers and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the capital Khartoum and its surroundings.

International and regional efforts have so far failed to end the fighting between Sudanese soldiers led by General Abdel Fattah Burhan and RSF under the leadership of General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo. Sudan has not had a government that has served since October 2021, when the military dissolved Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok's transitional government and declared a state of emergency, which by political powers was called a coup.