Over 7,000 Indians to be back from Libya by Thursday (Lead)
March 2nd, 2011 - 9:06 pm ICT by IANSNew Delhi, March 2 (IANS) Nearly 7,000 of 18,000 Indians living in Libya will be evacuated when four special Air India flights will bring back home 1,188 Indians Thursday from neighbouring Egypt.
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.
The government has faced criticism that it has been slow in evacuating its citizens from Libya compared to countries like the US and China.
Air India Wednesday said it had brought back 2,200 Indians from Tripoli since it began evacuation operations Feb 26.
Meanwhile, Jet Airways will operate its first flight to Tripoli later Wednesday.
Jet will operate a Boeing 737-800 aircraft from Delhi to Libya, with a passenger capacity of 178.
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Tags: air india, airbus 330, alexandria, boeing 737 800, boeing 737 800 aircraft, boeing 747s, china air, external affairs ministry, first flight, india time, indian government, indian nationals, indians, jet airways, libya, mv, neighbouring egypt, New Delhi, scotia prince, tripoli