(Eagle News) — The total number of repatriated Filipinos has reached 265,111 since February 2020, according to the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA).
The DFA said that it “continues in its ceaseless efforts to repatriate overseas Filipinos (OFs) affected by the pandemic” and reported the arrival of an additional 10,326 last week.
So far, of the total repatriated Filipinas, 83,866 are seafarers (31.63%) while 181,245 (68.37%) are land-based OFs.
The DFA said it mounted two chartered flights this week – one to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and another to Dili, Timor Leste. The two flights brought home 374 fellow Filipinos.
“The 60 OFs from Dili had been stranded in Timor Leste for several months as commercial flights remain prohibited from entering the country. The 314 OFs from Riyadh meanwhile, are distressed overseas Filipinos who requested for repatriation assistance from our Philippine Embassy in Riyadh,” the DFA said in a release.
Aside from them, the DFA, through its Philippine Embassy in Vientiane, also successfully brought home 46 stranded overseas Filipinos in Laos.
It said that a Myanmar National Airlines flight carrying repatriates from Myanmar, made a stop in Vientiane, Laos to pick up the 46 stranded Filipinos before finally heading home to Manila. Because of this arrangement, three OFs from Laos who had serious medical conditions, were able to join the repatriation flight, the DFA said.
The DFA also provided special repatriation assistance to the following Filipinos from all over the world: a kidnapped seafarer from Equatorial Guinea, a household service worker from Iraq, 102 distressed OFs from UAE, 22 stranded Filipinos in Malaysia, undocumented OFWs from Colombia, Iraq and Syria, a nonagenarian from the USA and eight minor children from Israel. The medical repatriations of an OFW with myoma from the Bahamas, an OFW who encountered a cycling accident in Singapore, and an OFW suffering from intermittent bleeding from Laos, were also successfully facilitated this week.
“Despite challenges, the DFA remains fully committed to its Assistance-to-Nationals mandate and its daily repatriation efforts in this ongoing battle against COVID-19 pandemic,” the DFA added.
(with a DFA release, Eagle News Service)
