Russia’s embassy in Tripoli on Wednesday evacuated 107 people from Libya, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
The UN Security Council imposed a no-fly zone over Libya on March 17, also permitting “all necessary measures” to protect civilians from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s attacks on rebel-held towns. The operation, codenamed Odyssey Dawn, is being conducted jointly by 13 states, including the United States, Britain and France.
The original plan was to evacuate a number of Russian Embassy employees, as well as a group of Russians and nationals of several other countries who wanted to leave by plane on March 26. However the Russian Foreign Ministry had to scrap that idea due to the tense situation in the country.
A column of trucks took the evacuees to Tunisian territory. There are Russians, Bulgarians as well citizens of CIS countries among them.
The humanitarian operation was implemented jointly with the Russian embassy in Tunisia. Western powers also helped with providing security for the column.
The evacuees will be delivered to the Tunisian island of Djerba.
“All the people will be sent to Moscow by a Russian Emergencies Ministry plane tonight,” the Foreign Ministry’s statement read.
MOSCOW, March 30 (RIA Novosti)