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Russia evacuates embassy in Libya after attack

January 30, 2014 at 10:44 am

Russia announced on Thursday that it has evacuated the staff from its embassy in Tripoli after the Libyan authorities said that they couldn’t guarantee their safety. The building was attacked on Wednesday.


A spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Aleksandr Lukashevich, said, “Due to the current situation, the decision was made to evacuate our embassy staff and their families (in Libya) through Tunisia.” This, he added, was after Libya’s Foreign Minister, Mohammed Abdel-Aziz, informed the Russian Ambassador that it was best for the staff to leave.

As such, explained Mr Lukashevich, on October 3rd, all the Russian embassy staff and their families crossed over safely into Tunisia. “They are scheduled to be flown back to Moscow on a private flight on October 4th,” he said. A chartered aircraft has flown to Djerba in southern Tunisia to complete the evacuation.

A skeleton staff of diplomats will stay in Tunisia to take of Libyan affairs for the Russian government. Meanwhile, Russian citizens have been advised not to travel to Libya.