In a disturbing development, the Indian nurses stuck in a hospital in Tikrit in Iraq have been moved to another location, a Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson said on Thursday.
“They are not going of their own free will. Our Embassy has been in touch even as they are moving to another location. I do not know what their destination is,” the spokesperson said, adding, “It is for their own safety that they have agreed to move out. All of them are safe and unharmed.”
The spokesman declined to get into the specific number of nurses, most of whom are from Kerala and Tamil Nadu, who had been moved. In response to a question on whether India had an idea about which direction the nurses may have been taken the spokesman said, “India is not alone. We have partners across Iraq and outside Iraq. We are working with our partners.”
Meanwhile, Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, who is camping in Delhi, told newspersons that there were 46 nurses who had been moved and added that attempts to get the UN and other humanitarian agencies to intervene in preventing the movement of the nurses were unsuccessful. The Chief Minister added that at least three of the nurses had received minor injuries in a bomb blast which occurred near the bus they were travelling in. He added that he was in touch with the nurses and that they were in safe custody at present.
“We have demanded that the Centre should take immediate steps. But the present situation in Iraq creates practical hurdles,” the Chief Minister said after a meeting External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.
The MEA spokesperson said that Chandy had discussions with the External Affairs Minister when he was briefed about the situation. “Both discussed the options for a way out,” he said. The latest developments on the nurses’ movement is considered serious, as when the fighting started, the International Red Crescent, which had established contact with the Indian nurses, had advised them against taking the land route out of Tikrit as it was considered unsafe.