The Ukrainian government has said it will evacuate citizens from Italy amid the worsening coronavirus outbreak there.
At an extraordinary meeting of the Cabinet on Saturday March 14, ministers discussed logistics for the evacuation of Ukrainians from Italy, which is by far the hardest-hit European country, with 17,660 confirmed infections and 1,266 deaths, almost all in the northern regions of Lombardy and Veneto.
In a statement published on its website and reported by Interfax-Ukraine, the Cabinet of Ministers said it had instructed the Ministry of Infrastructure, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to work together.
The Cabinet said that Ukraine must “ensure the urgent evacuation of Ukrainian citizens from the zone of outbreak of acute respiratory illness COVID-19 coronavirus in Italy”.
It is not clear how many Ukrainians the government aims to evacuate, but it’s understood from the Cabinet statement that Ukrainian officials will prioritize evacuating its citizens from the worse-affected zones in northern Italy.
Ukraine International Airlines will launch additional flights on its usual routes to bring home Ukrainian citizens who are abroad, the airline said on its Facebook page. UIA said it will fill the planes with economy class passengers only. On March 17, commericial air travel to and from Ukraine will cease.
“According to… the president of Ukraine, the authorities will organize special individual irregular flights to return citizens to Ukraine,” UIA said in a statement.
“UIA assures that it will provide all support to the authorities on the return of Ukrainians home. UIA warns that the number of available openings on its own regular flights on the 15th and 16th March is limited, and therefore asks to treat the airline’s limited capabilities under force major circumstances.”
At the time of writing, the UIA website showed no available tickets from Milan to Kyiv on March 15 or 16.
The government has instructed authorities to prepare for Ukrainians returning home: “In particular, the State Customs Service will have to quickly arrange for the cargo of crew members and passengers of the aircraft, which will carry out the evacuation,” the statement said, adding that the State Border Guard Service must ensure strong control over crossings of the state border.
Earlier on March 14, the Kyiv Post reported that 101 Ukrainian nationals were stuck at the border between Italy and Slovenia, where Slovenian border guards had refused them entry from Italy as they attempted to flee the coronavirus-stricken nation.
In response, the government said that those 101 stranded Ukrainian nationals will be brought home on a chartered plane in the next day or two.
The coronavirus pandemic has already claimed 5,443 lives globally, with nearly 147,000 confirmed cases, according to the latest official data, which also reports that 72,500 patients have recovered from the illness. Ukraine has three confirmed cases.
The World Health Organization has warned that Europe is now the epicenter of a global pandemic.
Some 4 million Ukrainians are involved in labor migration, with some 2.7 million working abroad at any one time, according to the Centre for Economic Strategy in Kyiv. Italy is the third most popular destination with 11% of Ukrainian labor migrant workers after Poland (40%) and Russia (25%).
