Romania’s Foreign Minister Emil Hurezeanu on Wednesday announced that 68 Romanian citizens in Iran have expressed their desire to leave the country immediately.

The diplomatic mission is in contact with 30 other people, the minister told a news conference at the Government House .

„We have centralised the number of Romanian nationals who have expressed their desire to leave the country immediately. At the Romanian Embassy in Tehran there are 68 people. The diplomatic mission is in contact with 30 other people. The difficulty of granting consular protection to Romanian citizens from mixed families remains, due to the restrictions imposed by the Azerbaijani side on Iranian citizens. Azerbaijan does not receive citizens with dual citizenship – one being the Romanian one – if the second is Iranian. They cannot, therefore, leave Iran for Azerbaijan. Only through Turkey is their transfer made. The land route to Turkey through the Kapi Koi border crossing is considered, depending on security developments,” Hurezeanu said.

At the same time, at the Romanian Embassy in Tel Aviv and at the Romanian Representative Office in Ramallah, 119 people requested evacuation and repatriation. The missions keep in contact with 279 Romanian nationals who have notified their presence in that space.

„At the Consulate General in Haifa, 40 people were assessed as priorities: women, children, people without financial means, medical cases for evacuation, repatriation. The contact with these people is still in place. At the Romanian Embassy in Amman, 44 Romanian nationals affected by the cancellation of flights continue to receive support and guidance from the diplomatic mission in order to identify the best options for leaving the Hashemite Kingdom.”

The minister added that three groups of pilgrims who were in the city of Bethlehem left the region and entered Egypt. Subsequently, they were taken over by a mobile consular team from the Romanian Embassy in Cairo. The last group, consisting of 40 citizens, landed on a special flight in Sofia on Tuesday evening, and 38 people later arrived in Romania.

Hurezeanu added that, after the beginning of the conflict on June 12 at night, the Romanian Foreign Ministry (MAE) activated a task force operating 24/7. There is also an active monitoring mechanism that includes: the network of embassies and consulates in the region and also embassies and consular representations in partner countries and organisations relevant to the issue of this crisis.

„The mechanism allows, on the one hand, to inform the President of Romania and the Prime Minister, as well as to react quickly, especially through consular policies, because we are interested, first of all, in the way in which Romanian citizens from the affected countries, from Israel, from Iran in the first place, can be evacuated or, upon request, repatriated. We are also interested in informing the public in this mechanism in terms of helping citizens.”

At the same time, MAE has posted on social media and popularised among Romanian citizens the contact details relevant to consular emergencies, asking them to register their presence in the area and to submit requests for assistance.

„The diplomatic missions and consular offices in Tel Aviv, Haifa, Ramallah and Tehran have notified, through direct telephone conversations, the Romanian nationals who had previously announced their presence in the area regarding the availability identified by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to leave the conflict zones,” the minister also said.

Through the campaign „A text message saves your life,” Romanian citizens in the states of the Middle East region have at their disposal the emergency coordinates of the diplomatic missions, communicated by text by all mobile operators in Romania, provided that they use a Romanian telephone card.

The text message is activated at the time of entry into the territory of the third state concerned and at the moment of its connection to a mobile phone network.

Government spokesman Mihai Constantin said that, from the first hours after the intensification of the armed conflict between Israel and Iran, Romania has taken measures to assist the Romanian nationals who are in the conflict areas and who would like to leave there.

„Today, the government approved a memorandum, under the tutelage of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to provide coordinated and efficient assistance, from now on, to these nationals and their families who will resort to these emergency evacuation services,” he said.

AGERPRES