MFA sets up center to help Thai people in Libya

BANGKOK, July 29 (TNA) - The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has set up a center to coordinate help for Thai people in Libya, where violence has not showed a sign of quick conclusion. Thai Deputy Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs Nattavudh Photisaro told journalists on Tuesday that the help center operates from 9am to 9pm every day, during which people can seek information through the phone number 02-643559, the fax number 02-6435522 and via Twitter at @MFAThai. Nattavudh said that his ministry will try to evacuate the first group of about 40 Thai people from the violence-plagued Libya as soon as possible. Fights over the past couple of years between the official force and illegal armed groups and between illegal armed groups themselves in Libya recently caused fire to fuel tanks in the compound of Tripoli Airport, killing 79 people and injuring more than 400 others, prompting many European countries to have told their nationals to leave the war-riddled nation. The Libyan government is calling for a truce and telling people to stay away from a five-kilometer radius of the Tripoli Airport. Meanwhile, the body of a 36-year-old Thai worker, Narakorn Kittiyangkul killed near Gaza Strip on July 23 by fighting between Israeli and Hamas forces, reached his home province of Nan in the Thai North on early Tuesday morning. The Hmong burial of his body will happen on July 31, following religious ceremonies from July 29-30. (TNA)