Richard Lord

All 11 T&T na­tion­als, who were work­ing in Libya, have been tak­en out of that coun­try, For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Dr Su­ru­jrat­tan Ram­bachan said in an in­ter­view yes­ter­day. In­ter­na­tion­al re­ports say that the gov­ern­ments of Britain and the Unit­ed States have been tak­ing their na­tion­als out of Libya as protest for the re­moval of that coun­try's pres­i­dent, Moam­mar Gaddafi, in­ten­si­fies. Ram­bachan said the T&T na­tion­als in Libya were work­ing in that coun­try's pe­tro­le­um sec­tor.

"As of this af­ter­noon, I be­lieve all of them would have been moved out of Libya," Ram­bachan added. He said "a cou­ple of them did get out on the (British gov­ern­ment's) char­tered flight." He said he was hap­py that "those na­tion­als would be safe, hav­ing ex­it­ed Libya." Ram­bachan said they left with hand lug­gage on­ly.

He said it was through the In­ter­net that con­tact was made with the na­tion­als in Libya as no tele­phones were work­ing there. Ram­bachan said what was in­ter­est­ing about the de­vel­op­ment in Libya was the dis­play of the peo­ple's de­ter­mi­na­tion to en­sure democ­ra­cy and free­dom pre­vailed. "What is in­ter­est­ing is that peo­ple are pre­pared to lose their lives in or­der to se­cure those free­doms and that is some­thing that touch­es me and all of us in T&T," he said.