It"s midnight in Sudan, and the ceasefire has begun The US-brokered ceasefire between the warring Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has officially started in Sudan, where hundreds have been killed and thousands have fled since the fighting began. The 72-hour ceasefire was earlier announced by the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, who welcomed the warring parties’ “commitment to work with partners and stakeholders for permanent cessation of hostilities and humanitarian arrangements”. But the truce is fraught – while agreeing to the ceasefire to support humanitarian efforts, the RSF warned against “the continued violations of the second party in non-compliance with the truce”. That’s it from me tonight, my colleague Helen Sullivan will take over. Japan’s military aircraft evacuated Japanese nationals and their family members totalling 45 people from Sudan, Kyodo news agency quoted prime minister Fumio Kishida as saying on Monday. Of the Sudanese who can afford to leave, many are fleeing Khartoum on crowded buses on the more than 900-kilometre desert drive north to Egypt. Some of the 800,000 South Sudanese refugees who previously fled civil war in their own country are now choosing to return, according to the UN refugee agency. In Khartoum, street battles have left the sky often blackened by smoke from shelled buildings and torched shops, AFP reports. “There was a rocket strike in our neighbourhood … it is like nowhere is safe,” resident Tagreed Abdin, an architect, told AFP. “Morgues are full. Corpses litter the streets” said Attiya Abdallah, head of the doctors’ union, which on Monday reported scores more casualties after sites in south Khartoum were “heavily shelled”. The US is helping from afar as thousands of Americans left behind in Sudan seek to escape fighting, after the US embassy evacuated all of its diplomatic personnel over the weekend and shut down. President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, defended the decision not to keep US forces or diplomats in Sudan to help its citizens evacuate as several US allies did and as the US has often done in conflict zones in the past. Instead, Sullivan told reporters, the US was now remotely assisting Americans trying to flee the country by road. US assistance on Monday included helping Americans link up with convoys of foreigners now attempting to make it through fighting toward safety on Sudan’s eastern border. The US also is placing intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets over the route from the capital, Khartoum, to the country’s main seaport, the Port of Sudan, to scope out safety threats, Sullivan said. Europe has evacuated more than 1,000 citizens, according to Josep Borrell, the EU foreign policy chief. France has airlifted 491 people from 36 countries, including 12 EU nations, to Djibouti since Sunday, while the Dutch defence ministry said a third flight carrying evacuees has left Sudan on Monday evening, transporting people to Jordan. Earlier on Monday, the government said about 60 Dutch nationals were successfully evacuated from Sudan. Italian defence minister Guido Crosetto said “all Italian civilians” who had asked to leave had been evacuated – 200 people flown out of the country in a military operation on Sunday. Vatican representatives were among those evacuated. Berlin said Monday three flights had left and a fourth was on its way to airlift a total of 400 people. A Spanish military plane with 100 passengers, 30 of them Spanish, left Sunday for Djibouti, Madrid said. And Finland said Monday it had evacuated 10 people so far. Meanwhile, Britain is facing mounting pressure to rescue 4,000 British and dual nationals trapped in Sudan. The government has been criticised for extracting only diplomats and their families. A UK Foreign Office minister said the government was looking at “every single available option” for rescuing British nationals and stressed the difficulties of such an operation. In case you’re just joining us: a three-day ceasefire is now in place in Sudan, and there are hopes that it will hold. Previous attempted ceasefires have failed over the course of 10 days of fighting that has so far killed at least 427 people and wounded more than 3,700, according to UN agencies. Hours before the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, announced the ceasefire, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, had warned that the fighting could “engulf the whole region and beyond”. Canada will introduce immigration measures to support Sudanese temporary residents who are in Canada and may be unable to return home due to the rapidly deteriorating situation in Sudan, the government said on Monday. Once the new measures, announced by Canadian immigration minister Sean Fraser are in place, Sudanese nationals can apply to extend their status in Canada and move between temporary streams, allowing them to continue studying, working or visiting family free of charge, the government said in a statement. To facilitate immigration applications for those still in Sudan so they can travel once it is safe to do so, the Canadian government said it will also prioritise processing completed temporary and permanent residence applications already in the system from people still in the country. This includes visitor visa applications for eligible immediate family members of Canadian citizens and permanent residents, it added. Hello, this is Helen Sullivan taking over our live coverage of the hostilities in Sudan. If you have questions or see news or information you think may be useful, the best place to get in touch with me is on Twitter @helenrsullivan or email: helen.sullivan@theguardian.com. It"s midnight in Sudan, and the ceasefire has begun The US-brokered ceasefire between the warring Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has officially started in Sudan, where hundreds have been killed and thousands have fled since the fighting began. The 72-hour ceasefire was earlier announced by the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, who welcomed the warring parties’ “commitment to work with partners and stakeholders for permanent cessation of hostilities and humanitarian arrangements”. But the truce is fraught – while agreeing to the ceasefire to support humanitarian efforts, the RSF warned against “the continued violations of the second party in non-compliance with the truce”. That’s it from me tonight, my colleague Helen Sullivan will take over. The minister for the armed forces James Heappey said it is “too dangerous” to have British troops rescue UK citizens trapped in war-torn Sudan. During a Monday night appearance on LBC’s Tonight with Andrew Marr, Heappey said: “I think people will have the evacuation from Kabul very firmly in mind. That’s the last time we saw this sort of event. But Kabul was very different.” When asked whether it was too dangerous to try to use British forces to evacuate people from Sudan, Heappey answered: “Yes. The danger is that other than the very tight and controlled mission that we did Saturday into Sunday to extract the diplomats over which we had a very tight degree of control.” “Beyond that, we would effectively be inserting foreign troops, not just us, there’ll be other countries that would want to do it, into the parts of Khartoum that has been the most hotly fought over,” he continued. RSF agrees to ceasefire to facilitate humanitarian efforts and evacuations Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have agreed to the United States-mediated 72-hour ceasefire in order to facilitate humanitarian efforts and evacuations, the paramilitary group said on Monday. In a statement posted on Twitter, an RSF spokesperson said: Based on mediation from the United States of America, the Rapid Support Forces agreed to a humanitarian truce for a period of 72 hours, starting at midnight tonight, in order to open humanitarian corridors, facilitate the movement of citizens and residents, enable them to fulfill their needs, reach hospitals and safe areas, and evacuate diplomatic missions. The Rapid Support Forces affirm their full readiness to cooperate, coordinate and provide all facilities that enable expatriates and missions to leave the country safely. The RSF continued with a warning “against the continued violations of the second party in non-compliance with the truce”. Sudanese Armed Forces and RSF agree to 72-hour ceasefire starting at midnight, says Blinken The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has announced the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) agreed to a 72-hour ceasefire starting at midnight on April 24. The statement by Blinken reads: Following intense negotiation over the past 48 hours, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have agreed to implement a nationwide ceasefire starting at midnight on April 24, to last for 72 hours. During this period, the United States urges the SAF and RSF to immediately and fully uphold the ceasefire. To support a durable end to the fighting, the United States will coordinate with regional and international partners, and Sudanese civilian stakeholders, to assist in the creation of a committee to oversee the negotiation, conclusion, and implementation of a permanent cessation of hostilities and humanitarian arrangements in Sudan. We will continue to work with the Sudanese parties and our partners toward the shared goal of a return to civilian government in Sudan. The UK government has a military team exploring the situation in Sudan as thousands of British nationals are stuck in the country, Reuters reports. Britain’s armed forces minister James Heappey announced on Monday that a UK military team is doing reconnaissance as the government held an emergency meeting on Monday about how to help an estimated 4,000 Britons evacuate the country. Heappey and other British officials are facing criticism for a slower extraction effort, as other countries have already begun evacuating citizens. Italian authorities evacuated 96 people from Sudan on Monday, as other nations hurry to evacuate their citizens out of the country amid a surge of violence, Reuters reports. On Monday, two Italian military air crafts carried 83 Italian nationals and 13 citizens of different nationalities out of the region. All 96 people were evacuated from Khartoum and taken to Djibouti, where a plane took off. At least 427 people have been killed amid the eruption in fighting starting 15 April. Three hospitals have also lost service and residential areas have become largely engulfed in fighting. UN António Guterres urged the UN security council to intervene in the situation in Sudan. Referring to the 15 council members, Guterres urged the security council to help return Sudan to a democratic transition following a 2021 military coup that occurred after the ousting of Islam autocrat Omar al-Bashir, reported Reuters. “We must all do everything within our power to pull Sudan back from the edge of the abyss ... We stand with them at this terrible time,” he said. Guterres added that he had authorised temporary relocation of some UN personnel and their families. The security council has planned a meeting on Sudan for Tuesday. Egypt’s ambassador in Sudan has denied reports that the country’s assistant military attache was killed, Reuters reports: Egyptian ambassador in Khartoum denied a Sudanese Army report that the country’s assistant military attache was killed by paramilitary Rapid Support Forces’ fire in the Sudanese capital, Egyptian foreign ministry said in a statement on Monday. Earlier in the day, the Sudanese army said in a statement that the Egyptian assistant military attache in Sudan was killed by RSF’s fire while he was driving his car in Khartoum. Egypt’s assistant military attache in Sudan was killed by paramilitary Rapid Support Forces’ fire while he was driving his car in Sudan’s capital city Khartoum, said the Sudanese army in a statement on Monday, Reuters reported.