ABANDONED BY AMERICA: How mother and toddler daughter risked their lives in daring escape from Sudan
ASHLAND, MASSACHUSETTS: A mother and her 18-month-old daughter have managed to get out of Sudan after spending a week stranded in the war-torn country even as the White House says it has 'no plans' to evacuate stranded Americans.
Trillian Clifford, a teacher who was teaching children of US embassy officials at Khartoum International American School, and her daughter Alma were among the 16,000 US citizens trapped in Sudan as a violent civil war broke out between the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) and SPLM-IO.
Clifford's family in Massachusetts announced on Tuesday, April 25, that she, along with her daughter, and all American teachers employed by the school have been able to safely leave Sudan. According to DailyMail, the mother-daughter duo were hiding in their apartment for ten days after the civil war broke out in the capital, Khartoum. However, they were able to escape and cross the border between 1 pm to 3 pm local time, said Rebecca Winter, Clifford's sister-in-law. But she added that both still had "several days of travel ahead of them" and are hoping to fly back to the US in "a few days." "They are exhausted but seem relieved to have crossed the border," said Rebecca.
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'There has been no humanitarian aid'
Describing the ordeal, Winter said Clifford was weaning her daughter off breast milk, noting "there has been no humanitarian aid due to the ongoing fighting. It went from everything was completely normal eight days ago to all of a sudden war started overnight." She said, "Clifford was told by the US embassy... for many days that because the fighting is so intense — and even the Sudanese people had never seen fighting in the capital this intense — that they had no idea if or when they would be able to get her supplies, like food and water."
'This is a very dangerous situation to be involved in'
According to AOL, Clifford moved to Sudan with her daughter last summer. Since the conflict started, she had been communicating with her family via text messages and occasionally, FaceTime. Before escaping, Clifford communicated to WBUR through voice memos from her apartment in Khartoum. She said, "So I am here with my 18-month-old daughter and we are in a relatively safe location. Although I would have to add, as a caveat, that it feels like nowhere in the city is particularly safe. We are hearing a lot of gunshots and explosions. There's definitely aircraft flying over continuously throughout the day. And we are taking the orders from the [US] Embassy — and from our employers as well — very seriously to stay low to the ground, stay as far away from windows as possible and to stay hidden, because this is a very, very dangerous situation to be involved in."
White House slammed for declining to evacuate trapped US citizens
The update of her escape came after White House spokesman John Kirby said on Monday, April 24, that it was not safe to evacuate the remaining Americans in Sudan as it would put them in "more danger" and advised to "shelter in place." On the other hand, President Joe Biden ordered American troops to evacuate fewer than 100 embassy personnel on April 22. But thousands of Americans are still trapped and Biden's administration has ruled out further evacuation. And this move has been called out. Brett Bruen, who served as an Obama diplomat and worked on the evacuation of the Ivory Coast during the Civil War in 2004, said that the advice as "unrealistic, dangerous, and deeply irresponsible." And further expressed, "This is not the way the United States behaved when I served overseas," adding that the "abandonment of Americans in Sudan is part of a problematic pattern of the Biden White House."
While Clifford's sister-in-law told WBUR, "We're just feeling really helpless. We hear of other countries working hard to try to get their citizens out. I know that it's hard for everyone right now — especially with the airport being under attack — but it feels awful when we're told that the US is saying, 'No, we don't have plans for evacuation.' I feel that that's unacceptable."