GOVERNMENT yesterday ordered the mandatory evacuation of Filipinos who are still in Ukraine after the Department of Foreign Affairs raised Alert Level 4 in the war-torn country.
“Due to the rapidly deteriorating security situation in Ukraine, the Department of Foreign Affairs has raised the crisis alert level for all areas in Ukraine to Alert Level 4,” the Philippine Embassy in Warsaw, Poland said in an advisory issued late yesterday.
The embassy in Poland has jurisdiction over Ukraine as Manila has no embassy in the said country.
As to how many Filipinos remain in Ukraine, the DFA said it is waiting for updates from the embassy in Warsaw, the honorary consulate in the capital Kyiv, and the DFA team sent to the western city of Lviv near the Polish border to assist the Filipinos.
After Russia attacked At the start of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia late last month, the DFA said about 380 Filipinos and working and living in Ukraine, and around 8,000 in Russia. Since then, the government has been conducting operations to move Filipinos to safer areas in Ukraine and to other countries.
As of March 4, the DFA said 109 Filipinos have been safely evacuated from Ukraine, including 19 who are already in Manila.
The DFA said three groups of Filipino evacuees from Ukraine, along with their dependents, arrived in Manila on Sunday, after being evacuated from Warsaw.
The first group consists of four Filipino adults and three Filipino-Ukrainian children with their three Ukrainian mothers.
The second group is made up of two Filipino adults, a Filipino-Ukranian child, and his Ukrainian mother while the third group consists of three Filipinos from Kyiv who traveled on their own own arrangements.
