Japan evacuates all citizens who wish to leave Sudan

TOKYO (Reuters) – All Japanese people who wished to leave Sudan have been evacuated, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Tuesday, part of an international exodus from an eruption of violence in the African nation.

In addition to the 45 who left late Monday night on a Japanese military flight, eight more have left with the help of France and other groups, Kishida told reporters.

It was not immediately clear if that eight included four Japanese who Kishida said late on Monday had left with the aid of France, the International Red Cross and others.

“The evacuation of all Japanese who wished to leave is now complete,” he said without giving further details.

Battles between the military and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) paramilitary group have killed at least 427 people and turned some residential areas into war zones.

The warring factions have agreed to a 72-hour ceasefire, starting on Tuesdy, although the two sides have not abided by several previous temporary truce deals.

(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka, Kantaro Komiya, Nobuhiro Kubo, Mariko Katsumura and Elaine Lies; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne and Lincoln Feast.)