(Photo from Department of Foreign Affairs)
MANILA, Philippines — Two hundred twenty seven Filipinos in war-torn Sudan have managed to safely evacuate to neighboring Egypt, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said on Friday.
The DFA said the latest batch joined the 51 Filipinos who had earlier crossed the Argeen border by land.
Philippine Ambassador to Egypt Ezzedin Tago met the Filipino evacuees upon crossing over the Sudan – Egypt border.
“There are now a total of 340 Filipinos from Sudan on Egyptian soil,” the DFA said in a statement.
DFA spokesperson Teresita Daza pointed out that the 62 other evacuees had traveled on their own.
“There was one group of Filipinos who arrived at Wadi Halfa, Sudan on April 26,” she told INQUIRER.net in a message.
Earlier, DFA Undersecretary for Migrant Workers Affairs Eduardo de Vega said the lengthy processing at the border for all foreign nationals, including Filipinos, was due to their lack of essential documents like passports and visas, among others.
Citing the report of the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), Malacañang on Thursday said 409 Filipinos, including 335 overseas workers and their families, had left Sudanese capital Khartoum for Egypt.
The DFA has raised the crisis status in Sudan to Alert Level 3, which means voluntary repatriation or evacuation is being provided amid deadly clashes caused by a power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group.
Although Sudan’s warring factions have agreed to extend the earlier declared 72-hour ceasefire, there is no certainty that the truce would hold since violence has again erupted in the African country.