New Delhi: Concerns remain for Indians stranded in the warzone Iraq. The Ministry of External Affairs said that there was bombing and firing in the vicinity where 46 Indian nurses in Tikrit are seeking refuge.
The MEA said that the nurses are safe and that the Iraqi government has been informed and efforts are on to extricate them. The MEA also said that 1,000 Indian nationals have indicated that they want to return.
As per plans, the Air Force may use its planes to fly out Indian nationals stranded in Iraq to safer places nearby such as Kuwait or UAE from where commercial airliners would ferry them back to India. As per the plan, if required, the IAF aircraft would be used to fly out citizens to safer nearby locations and then the commercial planes would take charge, defence sources said.
The Navy has already deployed its warships in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Aden in stand-by mode and they may be pressed into service based on the analysis of the situation in Iraq in next few days, they said. Depending on the situation in Iraq, the government will take a call on whether the 300-seater C-17 Globemaster III aircraft would be deployed or the 80-100 seater C-130J Super Hercules transport aircraft pressed into action there, the sources said.
After a batch of 94 Indians who flew back on Monday, an additional 136 are coming back, taking the total number of those who have left so far to 230. Indians who are coming out of Iraq are mainly from north India followed by Hyderabad and Kerala.
(With additional information from PTI)
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