Spokesperson reaffirms top priority given to safety of Vietnamese citizens in Ukraine

At the ministry’s regular press meeting held virtually, she noted when the Ukraine situation recorded tense developments, the Prime Minister issued Official Dispatch No. 201/CD-TTg, dated February 26, 2022, on the protection of Vietnamese citizens and legal entities, and some issues needing attention in the face of the Ukraine situation.

Recently, Foreign Minister Bui Thanh Son has continually held phone talks with his counterparts of Russia, Ukraine, and Romania, sent a letter to the Foreign Minister of Poland, and received the relevant countries’ ambassadors to Vietnam, asking for their assistance in guaranteeing maximum security and safety for Vietnamese citizens and their families and to create conditions for repatriation flights, according to Hang.

Amid extremely fast and complex developments of the situation in Ukraine, Vietnam’s ministries, sectors, and representative bodies in related countries have exerted all-out efforts to promptly arrange repatriation flights for Vietnamese people and their families, and help them deal with issues emerging and complete necessary procedures for bringing them home in a shortest period of time, with transparency ensured and priority given to the elderly, pregnant women, children, patients, and people with disabilities, the spokesperson said.

She informed that so far, six flights have been conducted, safely repatriating about 1,200 Vietnamese people and their family members who wish to return to Vietnam.

Hang also said certain problems have arisen during the citizen protection process, such as some people changed their mind and chose to go in their own ways, or wanted to wait for the war to end to come back to Ukraine. Others lacked or lost necessary papers, or their papers were out of date, needing support from the representative agencies. Vietnam’s representative bodies have made utmost efforts and worked closely with authorities and Vietnamese people’s associations in the host countries to address those problems, continually update information and swiftly handle emerging issues to quickly evacuate the expatriates from war zones, and safely bring them to Vietnam.

Efforts by domestic authorities, overseas representative bodies, airlines, and business sponsors have won over support and high evaluation from both the expatriates and people in Vietnam, Hang added.