By IANS,
New Delhi : Around 12,000 of the 18,000 Indians in Libya would be evacuated by Sunday evening with the latest batch of over 2,300 nationals being picked up by air and sea from the violence-hit north African country, the government said.
Three special Air India flights from Tripoli and one from Sebha in Libya, besides the Red Star One ferry from Libyan city Misurata picked up “a record number of over 2,300 Indian nationals”, the ministry of external affairs said.
“By late evening today (Sunday) more than two-third of our nationals would have been pulled out of Libya, totalling over 12,000,” the ministry said.
The second Boeing 747 sortie brought home another 400 passengers from Sebha to Mumbai and daily sorties have been scheduled to evacuate all the remaining persons from Sebha, over the next few days, said the ministry.
Besides Fly Dubai will undertake further daily sorties to clear out the remaining 360 passengers from Dzerba in Tunisia, while 580 citizens have already returned to India from Tunis in the last couple of days.
Meanwhile, chartered ship MV Scotia Prince in its second round picked up all the remaining 972 Indian nationals from Benghazi and was headed back to Alexandria in Egypt, where it was expected to reach Monday afternoon. The passengers in the vessel will be flown back to India on four special flights, including Indian Air Force’s IL-76 transport aircraft on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Another passenger ship MV Red Star One commenced its return journey to Malta from Misurata Saturday evening (Libyan time), with 301 Indians and 29 foreign nationals on board, including six from Bangladesh. “The vessel is expected in Malta by Sunday evening (Libyan time). The evacuees will be flown back to India on a special Jet Air and Kingfisher flights.”
The around 18,000 Indians living in Libya have been fleeing the country since widespread protests to oust long-time ruler Muammar Gaddafi erupted in the middle of February, leading to violence, fighting and chaos.
India launched ‘Operation Safe Homecoming’ Feb 26 to bring back its nationals – the biggest mounted since the August 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait that forced thousands of Indians to flee to Jordan from where they flew home.
The government said the pace of evacuation from Libya had been stepped up and would be concluded soon.