Abdelkader Al-Tayeb and his family have no electricity, food and water are running out, and they have been unable to leave their home in Khartoum where they took refuge after the outbreak of violence in the Sudanese capital this week.

The Canadian, who is visiting relatives in Sudan with his wife and two children, said that the fighting between the country’s army and competing paramilitary forces had unleashed chaos.

The 68-year-old man also said in a phone interview from Khartoum on Friday: “It is a very difficult situation. We lived through the worst night last night, and most of the day. The shelling and black smoke covered the sky.”

The situation in the Sudanese capital was generally stable a week ago, but skirmishes over the planned transition to democratic rule escalated last Saturday into fierce battles.

So far, the violence has resulted in the deaths of 413 people and injuries to 3,551 others, according to the World Health Organization.

Many have also fled the country’s capital to other parts of Sudan. Khartoum Airport is inaccessible, and the Canadian Foreign Minister said on Thursday that there is currently no way to evacuate Canadians from Sudan.

For his part, Al-Tayeb said shells fell just a few buildings away from his relative's house where he is taking shelter. He added that the Edmonton resident and his family had booked a return flight to Canada on May 9, but the airline changed it that week to May 16.

He continued that he has extended family living outside the capital where fighting is lighter, but many roads and bridges leaving Khartoum are blocked, and the risk of encountering violence on the way out is very high, he said.

Hicham Idris, another Canadian visiting Khartoum, said he is trying to leave Sudan by crossing its land border into Egypt. He had hoped to return to Canada from there.

In the same context, Global Affairs Canada said it knows that 1,663 Canadians are registered as being in Sudan and urged Canadians in the country who have not provided their details to the government to do so.

Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly said on Thursday that Canadians in Sudan should shelter in place, adding that Canada is “constantly” assessing the situation.