Nepal has sought assistance from India to evacuate its trapped nationals from Ukraine as New Delhi pulls out all stops, launching Operation Ganga, an ambitious rescue operation to evacuate over 20,000 Indians, mostly students, from the war-hit country.  New Delhi has a long record of evacuating nationals of neighboring countries from conflict zones. 

Close to 300 Nepalese are believed to be trapped in Ukraine and neighboring countries, as per reports in Nepali media. The Nepali government has reached out to the Indian government to rescue its nationals along with Indians. India has given a positive response to the request. 

The process to evacuate Nepali nationals from Ukraine is already underway by India, according to a report in Wion. Some Nepalese have already been rescued from Ukraine. 

Last year, following the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan,  India had also rescued a number of Nepalese working in various projects in the country. Prior to that India had rescued many foreign nationals, including Nepalese, when the war erupted in Yemen in 2015, and from China in 2020 after the outbreak of Covid-19. 

India, which has a stellar record when it comes to large and complex evacuation operations, often receives similar assistance requests from South Asian countries, barring Pakistan. This time, a number of Pakistani and Turkish students in Ukraine were helped by Indian students to cross the Ukrainian border along with them, marching behind hastily tailored Indian flags 

(SAM)Male on Wednesday, according to shipping database MarineTraffic.

The Titan, another superyacht owned by Alexander Abramov, a co-founder of steel producer Evraz, arrived on 28 February. Three other yachts are seen moving around the Maldives. 
 
(SAM)