151 passengers arrived in Skopje by plane from the UAE, including one citizen each of Montenegro, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

A total of 151 passengers, including one citizen each from Montenegro, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, arrived in Skopje last night on the first evacuation flight from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of North Macedonia.

The charter flight of the airline "Fly Dubai", which carried the first group of Macedonian citizens in an organized evacuation from the UAE, was welcomed at the "Skopje" International Airport by Minister of Foreign Affairs Timco Mucunski.

"This is the first group returning from the UAE. There were 151 passengers on this charter flight organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Most of them were Macedonian citizens, but there were also several foreign citizens. One citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, one citizen of Serbia, one citizen of Montenegro, two citizens of Kosovo and four citizens of the Netherlands," Mucunski told reporters.

He noted that priority on this first evacuation flight was given to certain groups of citizens who needed urgent evacuation.

"We expect the next plane on Tuesday, when a second group in similar numbers will arrive in North Macedonia. We are scheduling the third flight for mid-week, we are still waiting to see if the interest of our citizens will increase, so that we can fully utilize the capacity we have," said Mucunski.

He pointed out that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of North Macedonia is also working on the evacuation of Macedonian citizens who are in Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait.

"We will take them to Saudi Arabia and expect a plane to bring them from there on Wednesday. That plane will probably have to land on Kosovo territory, but we will organize transportation from Pristina airport to Skopje," said Mucunski.

More than 600 Macedonian citizens are expected to be evacuated from the Middle East.

The government of North Macedonia has allocated 60 million denars (about one million euros) for the evacuation of Macedonian citizens on charter flights from countries affected by conflicts in the Middle East.