An estimated four thousand British citizens have needed evacuation from Sudan. The UK government commenced its evacuation effort on Tuesday, 25th April, after it had reportedly evacuated its diplomats.

By contrast, one day earlier, on Monday 24th April, EU High Representative Josep Borrell announced that 31 flights would have evacuated an estimated 1,200 EU citizens by the end of the day, with a remaining 400 EU citizens left to be evacuated. “There has been an incredible mobilisation of the [EU] Member States” said Mr Borrell, “that have air facilities and air capabilities to move planes, to move soldiers and to move military protection, and taking everybody that they could”.

The UK has denied that its efforts to evacuate embassy staff from Sudan last weekend interfered with Germany’s plans to get its citizens out. It is said that the Sudanese army initially closed access to the key airport after being infuriated by the unauthorised presence of British armed forces on the site.

The delay in British evacuation was one of the reasons why the British Ambassador had to negotiate an extension of the 72-hour ceasefire between the warring factions to allow for more time. The FCDO said eight flights had airlifted 897 people to Cyprus as of Thursday, 27^th April. Hopefully the UK has asked EU Member States – alongside the United States – to lend a helping hand to get everyone evacuated, as used to be the case automatically when the UK was a EU Member State. Australia has just thanked France for assisting in the evacuation of its citizens.

The difficulty of non-British nationals with UK residency permits – such as the well-publicised case of Sudanese-born Dr Abdulrahman Babiker and 23 other NHS doctors – to board UK rescue flights has also been heavily criticised by Layla Moran amongst others. If there are any spare seats on a flight, they must certainly be allocated to them.

Liberal Democrats Overseas have been concerned for some time on behalf of British citizens abroad about the preparedness of British Embassies and Consulates to help them in times of crisis. This should include the obligation for British citizens resident in a country to register with and update their contact details with their British Embassy or Consulate and ensuring British consular staff have the capacity to alert them directly in times of crisis, including for natural disasters such as earthquakes.

Liberal Democrats Overseas will call for an official enquiry to be held once the emergency is over about the state of preparedness of British Embassies and consulates to assist their citizens in emergencies. The FCDO needs to ensure that assisting British citizens abroad is given a far greater priority than it is now, in line with best practice existing in other comparable European embassies.

* George Cunningham is Vice-Chair of the Lib Dem Friends of Armed Forces and Honorary President of Lib Dems Overseas. https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-cunningham-a6b160178/