Uganda’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has evacuated 43 students from Iran to Türkiye as the escalating conflict between Iran and the United States and Israel continues, a top government official said here.
The students were transported by road from Tehran to Istanbul on Saturday and are currently awaiting repatriation to the East African country, John Mulimba, Uganda’s minister of state for foreign affairs in charge of regional cooperation, told reporters late Monday.
“We have a number of students who are in Iran pursuing different studies. Some were in Tehran, the capital city, which is actually the center of the conflict. Others are in different cities,” Mulimba said. “As [the] government of Uganda, we gave priority to those students who are studying within Tehran. We have managed to evacuate 42 of them. As we speak now, they arrived safely in Istanbul,” he added.
The official said that the government’s plans to evacuate and facilitate the return of Ugandan nationals trapped in Iran have been complicated by the rapidly changing security situation and the closure of airspace in the region.
“It’s a bit complex and difficult to evacuate now.” Malimba said. “We are going to get those that we shall manage to get out [from Iran] and make them safe. We have tried to give advisory to our people who are out there to keeping being safe, operate from home, don’t get out to the streets and make sure that you communicate to our embassies through the internet,” he said.
According to the ministry, Ugandan diplomatic missions in the region will deploy officers to receive the evacuees and facilitate their return home through neighboring countries.
