The scenes she captured on her phone as she left give a clear picture of the violence gripping the Sudanese capital since the power struggle between the army and the Rapid Support Forces escalated into all-out war on April 15.
The clashes claimed the lives of at least 512 people.
“I’ve been calling the British embassy all day, every day for a week, to find out when we can be evacuated,” she told Reuters from Aswan.
“We didn’t receive any concrete plan after a week, and then I decided to take matters into my own hands because we ran out of water,” she added.
She recounted how she had to cope with running out of food supplies at a time when shooting, shelling and air strikes continued outside.
Britain, which has about 4,000 citizens in Sudan, began air evacuations on Tuesday to Cyprus. The country faced criticism for being late in evacuating its nationals compared to other European countries.
Rozan Ahmed said she and others worked on a plan to escape after hearing some were heading north by bus to Egypt.
“We rented a bus. We were about 50 people. Navigating the war zone was the scariest part.”
About that experience, she says: “We passed several times with tanks and heavily armed people. We were terrified because we heard reports of bus stops, robberies and people being shot. This made me really scared. But we had no choice.”
She added that despite her feeling of extreme fear, she held her nerve well and did not seem to feel anything.
Her journey from Khartoum to the Egyptian border took 12 hours, but it took her a day and a half to enter Egypt because of the queues.
She plans to leave Egypt after spending a few days there to recover from her ordeal.
“My heart is still in Sudan,” she said. “I can’t stop thinking about those who are stuck there, who have no way to get out. I really hope and pray that evacuations take place now. That there is support and help.”
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