Thaindian News

New Delhi, March 2 (IANS) The Indian Air Force (IAF) will Thursday fly out a transport plane to airlift Indians stranded in strife-torn Libya to Cairo in Egypt, from where they would be brought home in special flights operated by Air India and private airlines, an officer said Wednesday.

“An IL-76 is now at Palam technical area and is expected to fly out to Cairo tomorrow (Thursday) morning en-route to Libya,” an IAF spokesperson said.

He refused to disclose the precise landing destination of the aircraft “for reasons of safety of evacuees”.

The aircraft, he said, “will airlift Indians out of the (north African) country upto Cairo, whereafter other arrangements by the ministry of external affairs will take over.”

A second IL-76 is also being readied to fly, if required, to Libya, where fierce battles continued Wednesday as people who have risen in protest against the 41-year rule of Muammar Gaddafi braved armed attacks to hold on to major towns.

Alarmed over the worsening crisis, which has killed between 1,000-2,000 people in a little over two weeks. Nearly 140,000 people, Indians included, have fled the country, which is feared to be hurtling towards civil war

India began the evacuation of its citizens last week and nearly 7,000 of the 18,000 living in Libya will be evacuated by Thursday from neighbouring Egypt, with four special Air India flights bringing back 1,188 Indians.

Three flights - two Boeing 747s and one Airbus-330 - brought back 1,045 Indians from Tripoli early Wednesday.

Another three flights have left for Tripoli and are expected to ferry back 1,002 people.

Three daily flights shall continue to Tripoli over the coming days and these may be stepped up, said the external affairs ministry Wednesday.

MV Scotia Prince, a ship chartered by the Indian government, is likely to reach Alexandria in Egypt around 8 p.m. (11.30 p.m. India time) Wednesday with 1,188 people.

Four special flights will bring them to India Thursday.

“By the end of today (Wednesday), 6,177 Indian nationals will have been pulled out of Libya. This constitutes just over a third of the estimated 18,000 Indian nationals in Libya,” the ministry said.