All citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina who were tourists in the Middle East and requested evacuation have been returned to the country, while the current number of residents in the region is mostly BiH citizens who work there, said BiH Foreign Minister Elmedin Konaković.
He said that if there are still BiH citizens in the Middle East who want to return, and it is probably a small number of people, they can independently organize their arrival in BiH.
“There was a group of tourists from BiH in Qatar who were not under any particular pressure to return, given that they had paid for their accommodation. They were not in a hurry, but I believe they have arrived home by now,” said Konaković, adding that a review of the situation will be conducted this afternoon to determine how many people still have expressed a desire to leave the Middle East countries in principle.
He noted that the current number of residents in the Middle East is mostly BiH citizens who work in the region, and that they were not in the status of tourists.
“In communication with them, we have repeatedly offered them different return options, but they mostly did not want to leave the region. They were waiting to see whether the situation would escalate or not. We are still monitoring the situation,” the minister said in a statement to Fena.
He pointed out that through the European Civil Protection Mechanism, in cooperation with Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia and other countries, hundreds of citizens have been returned to BiH.
“After we managed to return hundreds of people, it was not rational to organize charter flights for ten, 20 or 30 people, given that such flights cost more than 400,000 BAM. Instead, we are using other available evacuation models through international cooperation,” Konaković explained.
Speaking about the current situation in air traffic, Konaković stressed that the frequency of flights has increased significantly:
“Most airports are operating normally. There are certain problems with flights in Kuwait, but even Qatar has operational lines from Doha. Airports in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Oman, Muscat and Jeddah are operating in a regular mode”.
He added that numerous commercial lines are available, especially to Istanbul, which is one of the simplest transit points for returning to BiH.
“The fact is that we do not have ‘closed skies’, which is why there is no need for complex evacuation operations. At this moment, it is primarily a technical type of support for our citizens”, concluded Konaković.
The return of BiH citizens from Middle Eastern countries occurred in the context of a sharp deterioration in the security situation in the Middle East region. The conflict began on February 28, when Israel and the United States carried out coordinated air and missile strikes on multiple targets in Iran, marking the beginning of open combat operations.
