Indonesia Has Evacuated 1,036 Citizens from Yemen: Ministry

Jakarta (Antara) - Indonesia so far has evacuated 1,036 of its citizens from Yemen, the Foreign Ministry said in its press statement here on Sunday. \"Today, (April 12) a total of 43 Indonesian citizens (WNI) are expected to arrive home from Yemen. With their arrival, the number of WNIs already evacuated since December 2014 totals 1,036,\" the ministry said in its statement. According to the foreign ministry, security conditions in Yemen, particularly around the Aden and Sana\'a cities were deteriorating. The armed clashes among the conflicting parties were also escalating. These conditions had posed difficulties in the efforts to evacuate the Indonesian citizens there, thus forcing the team to follow special scenarios for the evacuation process. The Indonesian government has dispatched an integrated team to Yemen and Salalah, Oman to evacuate WNIs. It mobilized an airplane Boeing 737-400 belonging to the Air Force (TNI AU) and one ship chartered from Djibouti. The integrated evacuating team consisted of 48 personnel from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the TNI AU, the National Police (Polri) and the State Intelligence Agency (BIN). The Indonesian citizens\' evacuation operation in Yemen also involves five Indonesian representatives from the Embassy in Sanaa, Embassy in Riyadh, Embassy in Muscat, Embassy in Addis Ababa, and the Consulate General in Jeddah. The team members assigned in Hudayah, Tarim and Al-Mukalla, Aden (Yemen), Salalah (Oman) and Djibouti continue to collect data and make approaches to the relevant authorities. They monitor the on-going conditions to carry out the evacuation of Indonesian citizens out of Yemen. Besides, the evacuation team in South Yemen is still exploring the availability of ships from Djibouti to pick up WNIs trapped in Aden. Many ships are afraid to call at the city\'s port because of unfavorable and unstable security conditions. Data collected by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs indicated that there are still a number of Indonesian citizens who are housed in accommodating facilities in various Yemeni regions for further evacuation. Based on the data, 58 citizens are still in Sana\'a, 37 in Hudaydah, 423 in Tarim, 260 in Mukalla and 111 in Aden. The Indonesian government continues to appeal its citizens to be prepared for evacuation before the situation becomes further deteriorated.(*)