People wait to be evacuated near an airport in Omdurman, Sudan, April 26, 2023. (Xinhua)
"To be honest with you, the State Department was useless, utterly useless throughout this entire period," said Imad, who asked to withhold his last name, and whose parents were traveling from Khartoum to Egypt.
NEW YORK, April 28 (Xinhua) -- As the crisis in Sudan continues to unfold, there is mounting anger among Americans who feel abandoned by the U.S. government and left to navigate the complicated and dangerous situation on their own, reported CNN on Thursday.
"Despite a number of nations evacuating their citizens, the U.S. government has continued to say that the conditions are not conducive to a civilian evacuation," said the report. "All U.S. government personnel were evacuated in a military operation this weekend. U.S. officials have said they are in 'close communication' with U.S. citizens and 'actively facilitating' their departure from Sudan."
However, CNN spoke with multiple people whose family members are among the "dozens" of Americans who want to leave Sudan, and they said the State Department has provided "barely any assistance" since the deadly violence between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) broke out more than a week ago.
"To be honest with you, the State Department was useless, utterly useless throughout this entire period," said Imad, who asked to withhold his last name, and whose parents were traveling from Khartoum to Egypt. "We expected the Department to provide some kind of guidance, but the guidance was the template, just shelter in place, no critical information being provided."
The interviewees also pushed back on the argument made by U.S. officials that they had warned Americans not to be in Sudan. The travel advisory level has been Level 4: Do Not Travel since June 2021, and the State Department has consistently advised Americans to "have evacuation plans that do not rely on U.S. government assistance." However, there were no recent security alerts explicitly advising Americans to leave the country. ■
