Turkey begins evacuating nationals from Sudan

On Wednesday, Turkey began to evacuate its citizens stranded in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum, due to the suspension of flights following the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Turkish ambassador in Khartoum, Erfan Naziroglu, announced that two Turkish Airlines planes took off from Khartoum International Airport, the first at about 10am and the second at 1:15pm local time, with 363 Turkish citizens onboard heading to Ankara.

Naziroglu added that: “These airplanes landed in Khartoum in coordination with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, his deputy Fuat Oktay and the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.”

He explained: “We secured morning and noon flights for 363 Turkish citizens onboard of two planes. Also, a month ago, we had transported all the students who wanted to return to Turkey.”

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The Turkish ambassador continued: “Since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, we flew 415 Turkish citizens home via Turkish Airlines, in addition to transporting 152 others onboard of a private plane.”

On Friday, the Turkish authorities launched a massive evacuation of 25,000 citizens from 59 countries so as to allow them to spend Ramadan and Eid Al-Fitr with their families.

As of Wednesday noon, COVID-19 has infected more than 2,573,000 people worldwide, with a death toll that increased reaching 178,000, and a recovery rate estimated at more than 701,000, according to Worldometer, a reference website that provides real-time statistics of the virus victims.