EU helpt lidstaten bij evacuatie burgers uit Libië (en)

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The EU's Monitoring and Information Centre is supporting member state efforts to evacuate the remaining 2,500 European citizens trapped inside Libya, amid reports of ongoing violence on Friday (25 February).

Run by the commission, the MIC is a "one-stop-shop" for the civil protection resources owned by its 31 members (EU27, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Croatia). Any country affected by a major disaster, either member or non-member, can apply for assistance under the mechanism.

"Our role is to identify additional transport capacities that can be made available," Hans Das, head of the MIC's 15-man emergency response unit told EUobserver, regarding its role in the Libya evacuations.

Estimates suggest roughly 2,500 European citizens are still struggling to leave Libya, with Tripoli's airport chaotic but functional, while Benghazi's in the east is out of operation.

Most EU states have taken charge of their own evacuation operations. Among the unilateral initiatives, Britain is sending a Royal Navy destroyer to the Libyan coast, with around 100 Bulgarians set to leave Benghazi aboard a Turkish ship when seas become calmer, Reuters reports.

Germany is sending three ships for its citizens, a Spanish military plane carrying 124 people landed in Madrid on Friday, while Athens has evacuated 227 Greeks and Cypriots from Tripoli and Sabha aboard three C-130 military aircraft.

Roughly 1,000 EU citizens are estimated to be stuck in the eastern part of the country which are no longer under the control of Moammar Gaddafi. "About 100 EU citizens working for various oil companies are trapped in the north-eastern town of Jalu, of which 30 to 40 are in a company office without access to food," said Mr Das giving an example.

Efforts are now under way to find a small aircraft which can land on the company's private airstrip, with the external action service's intelligence body (SitCen) holding a teleconference with member states on the subject on Thursday evening.

On Friday afternoon France made a ship available to the MIC after the EU body put out a request. It will leave Malta this evening and arrive in Benghazi tomorrow, with EU member states indicating they want to put 200 citizens on board. France had decided to waive the 50 percent co-funding of transport costs that the MIC can provide.

Of the 15 people working in the emergency response unit in the Beaulieu region of Brussels, 10 are member state officials on secondment, helping to co-ordinate member state transport offers with the list of requests. "We are not here to take over from member states," insists Mr Das.

Since Wednesday when the Hungarian EU presidency activated the EU's Civil Protection Mechanism, ten non-EU member states have also contacted the MIC for assistance, including Ukraine and the Philippines.

France has also offered to make a military airbus available, together with a second ship from 3 March.

A far greater number of non-EU citizens appear to be trapped inside Libya. Roughly 1.5 million Egyptians, 30,000 Chinese and 7,000 from Turks are still inside north Africa state, reports the BBC.

The EU announced on Friday it would provide €3 million in humanitarian aid to help those suffering as a result of the violence.