109 Macedonian citizens evacuated from Middle East

Another 100 other citizens of the country are expected to be evacuated by the United Arab Emirates soon. Minister of Foreign Affairs Timco Mucunski said the initial interest in evacuation was higher but then the refusal followed, so authorities are left to make final assessments for organising the next flight. Last night, 151 passengers arrived safely at Pristina Airport.

Among them, 109 citizens were North Macedonia and 42 other states, such as Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia, Greece and other countries.

We'll see what interest is or if there's interest in returning, and we'll organize this flight. Of course it will need to be realised, but we continue to be in touch with our citizens there. There's already a list of 300 people reported evacuations, but many have refused evacuation. My assessment is that in the event of another flight, there will be about 100 people who will be evacuated,” said Timco Mucunski, minister of foreign affairs.

To evacuees, the feeling of uncertainty was the main reason to leave despite the fact that during the day everything seemed normal.
We witnessed the explosions. Fortunately, in our vicinity there were no but heard,” said Dragan Tomevski, evacuated.
And he lived there while I was visiting. It happened what happened and we didn't make it back. We are now happy to be home,” said Slavica Tomevska, evacuated.

We haven't seen anything but it's just that when you hear the sound of sirens and missiles, it's not nice. During the day everything was normal but we weren't sure how the events would take place, so we decided to go back,” said Lidija Knjazava, evacuated.

Citizens who landed at Pristina Airport see part of the third group of evacuees from crisis areas in the Middle East. Most of the passengers were from Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. /Alsat/