DFA urged to ready humanitarian flights for OFWs in Ukraine

Travellers wait at the the departures board ahead of their flights at the Boryspil airport some 30 kilimetres outside Kyiv on February 13, 2022. – Ukraine on February 13, 2022, vowed to keep its airspace open to international travel despite Western warnings that Russian troops conducting drills near its borders could invade at any point. (AFP)

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) must immediately schedule humanitarian flights and fly 380 overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in Ukraine to safety amid warnings of an impending Russian invasion there, senatorial candidate and Sorsogon Gov. Francis “Chiz” Escudero said.

“As other countries are calling on their citizens to leave Ukraine, I urge our DFA, if they have not done so, to do the same,” he said in a statement on Sunday.

“We should also be ready to provide free humanitarian flights for our OFWs and repatriate them back to our country safely,” he added.

Escudero likewise asked the DFA to monitor the conditions of Filipinos living in Ukraine’s neighboring countries of Belarus and Moldova, raising concern that these areas may be affected if the situation worsens.

DFA Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public and Cultural Diplomacy Gonar Musor earlier said the Philippine Embassy in Poland is already “in touch” with the Filipino community in Ukraine. The said embassy has jurisdiction over Ukraine.

The DFA official said most Filipinos in Ukraine are “far away from the eastern border near Russia” and live in Kyiv and the surrounding areas, Escudero noted.

Filipino workers in Ukraine were also urged to contact the Philippine embassy and report any untoward incident. Jericho Zafra, Inquirer.net trainee