Defense Minister Margarita Robles announced on Wednesday that two Air Force planes would travel tomorrow to Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, to evacuate some 350 Spanish citizens who informed the Spanish embassy of their intention to leave the country. The announcement comes just hours after Iran attacked Israel with nearly 200 ballistic missiles in response to the assassination of Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah and the Israeli ground incursion into Lebanon.
Although so far the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Defense have been “very careful”, as Robles acknowledged, with the evacuation operations, the Minister of Defense assured that the planes of the The Air Force were “prepared” and that tomorrow, Thursday, they will head towards Lebanon despite the “situation of the airspace of the different countries”, on maximum alert, with cuts and multiple flights canceled after the intense bombardments in recent days in the south and center of Beirut.
This morning, the Spanish Embassy in Beirut urged Spaniards present in Lebanon who have difficulty leaving the country by commercial means and who have not previously contacted the Embassy in Beirut, to contact consular emergencies to organize evacuation preparations. There is so far no evidence of Spanish casualties in the conflict.
The consular register of Spain in Lebanon has around a thousand registered Spaniards, including Spanish nationals (the majority already having dual nationality), their foreign parents and people in transit, as the minister recalled yesterday of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares. Among them, some 350 Spaniards have informed the embassy of their desire to leave the country.
In recent days, the government has urged Spanish citizens in Lebanon to immediately leave the country, where possible, via existing trade routes. After the Iranian attack yesterday against Israeli military positions with more than 180 ballistic missiles, and the bombings of the Israeli Defense Forces against the southern suburbs of Beirut, stronghold of the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah, “the airspace of different” countries suffered cuts. and we are in a situation of maximum alert,” Robles said, making it difficult for Spaniards in Lebanon to exit the country through commercial means.
(news in extension)
