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All 6 Filipinos trapped in Libya safe refuse to be repatriated, Embassy says

The six Filipinos trapped in the outskirts of Tripoli are all safe, the Philippine Embassy in Tripoli said Saturday.

Embassy Chargé d’Affaires Elmer Cato said: “We just talked to them, they are still there, the fighting stopped at 1 am but has resumed. They did not request to be extracted.”

Prior to this, mortars also struck on Wednesday the Al Afia Clinic, located about 29 kilometers south of Tripoli where 18 Filipino nurses were working. Cato said all are safe and evacuated by their employers but they still refused to be repatriated.

“Despite all our efforts, we just could not convince them to take our offer to bring them home while we still can,” Cato said.

He added that they will continue to go where they are, call them, and engage them online.

Cato said the situation in Tripoli is “becoming increasingly dangerous” for Filipinos.

“We would like to appeal to the families in the Philippines of Filipinos here in Tripoli to help us convince them to go home,” Cato said in his Facebook account.

Last Tuesday, Cato recalled that a rocket attack hit a neighborhood in Tripoli where 200 Filipinos are residing. One Filipino, identified as Roland Torres, was slightly wounded in the forehead.

Torres said he has been working in Tripoli since 2006 and witnessed the fall of Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi.

“But the attack last night that wounded the Nueva Ecija native in the forehead was different. He now wants to go home,” Cato said.

Of the 1,000 Filipinos living in Tripoli and areas outside it, there are only 22 Filipinos who requested to be evacuated including Torres who has already recuperated from his slight wounds.

Seven of those 22 Filipinos have been repatriated and have returned already. Four of these seven who repatriated are not even OFWs but are students from the Islamic Call College in Tripoli.

Cato said the Embassy will continue to persuade Filipinos in Libya to come home.

Photo credit: AFP

Staff Report

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