Over 800 Indians being evacuated from Lebanon

NEW DELHI: About 800 more Indians who have been evacuated by the Indian Navy from strife-torn Lebanon are being flown home on two Air India flights, it was announced here Monday.

One flight with some 400 émigrants from Delhi, Punjab and Haryana will land at the Delhi airport late Monday.

The other flight with a similar number of south India-bound evacuees will land at Chennai around the same time, the ministry of overseas Indian affairs said in a statement, adding that Minister Vayalar Ravi was personally reviewing the evacuation operation.

This is the second group to be evacuated from Lebanon and brings to 1,400 the total number of Indians that have brought out of the country as the Israeli defence forces continue their relentless attacks on Hezbollah guerrillas in southern Lebanon.

There were a total of 12,000 Indians in Lebanon before the hostilities erupted earlier this month.

Meanwhile, the body of Debesh Kumar Swain who died in the bombings in southern Lebanon, was flown here Monday morning by a Syrian Airways flight and subsequently transported to Bhubaneswar by an Indian airlines flight and handed over to his relatives, the ministry statement said.

Giving details of the evacuation from Beirut, an Indian Navy spokesman said three warships had brought out 887 people and transported them to Larnaca in Cyprus early Monday morning.

Of these, the destroyer INS Mumbai carried 445 people and the frigates INS Brahmaputra and INS Betwa 188 and 254 people respectively.

Of these, there were 784 Indian nationals, 57 Sri Lankans, 41 Nepalese, and five Lebanese.

This is the first time the frigates were deployed for the evacuation. INS Mumbai had brought out the first lot of evacuees to Larnaca Thursday evening, from where they were flown home Friday night.

The three warships, as also the fleet tanker INS Shakti, had now stationed themselves in international waters between Cyprus and Lebanon to await word on whether any other Indians wished to be evacuated.

The four vessels were sailing home after an overseas deployment to eastern Mediterranean port and were about to enter the Suez Canal when they were ordered to turn around as the situation in Lebanon worsened.

"They have adequate provisions and supplies to stay at sea for at least a month-and-a-half," a navy spokesman here said.

The ministry of overseas Indian affairs has set up a 24x7 control room here that can be reached at 011-26874250, 24197972 and 24197984 (fax). Help desks have also been set up at Chennai (09840707835) and Delhi (09868800769, 011-25694410).