A special chartered aircraft flew out 127 Malaysians from strife-torn Libya today, National Security Council secretary Mohamed Thajudeen Abdul Wahab said.
He said the Boeing 727 aircraft, carrying the Malaysians and 59 people of other nationalities, left the Tripoli international airport at about 10.30am (Malaysian time) and landed in the Tunisian capital of Tunis an hour later.
It is believed that five Malaysian students opted to remain in Tripoli, the
capital of Libya which is seeing an uprising against its leader, Muammar Gaddafi.
Mohamed Thajudeen said the plan was to fly the evacuated Malaysians from Tunis to Rome in a C-130 aircraft of the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) and from Rome to Malaysia by a MAS flight scheduled to leave the Italian capital at 1.30pm (Malaysian time) today.
“We are trying to get clearance from the Tunisian authorities for the RMAF aircraft to land in Tunis,” he told Bernama when contacted here.
– Bernama
Sashidaran Gunathevan
Maran Perianen
Yalinie Mathan
