flights out of sudan. deputy prime minister 0liver dowding will be chairing a cobra meeting, that is the uk government s emergency committee later on this afternoon, to talk about evacuations, the current security situation. with such small numbers apparently coming forward to get on these flights, the opposition labour party has said the criteria to get on them should be expanded and it should be open to anyone resident in the uk and not just passport holders. the government is stressing they have had a longer window for getting onto evacuation flights than any other western nation, they are happy with how this operation has gone. about 1500 people, slightly over that, have been taken out of sudan on these flights. 2000 people registered interest in the foreign office s application programme. the uk government are hoping that 24 hour window of notice they announced yesterday ending