The first air-force rescue flight carrying Australians and Afghans with visas from Kabul has landed in Perth.
A tricky operation, around 90 evacuees onboard the flight from Dubai landed early Friday morning in WA and were met by federal and state police in full protective gear, before being ferried off to hotel quarantine at the Hyatt Regency Perth Hotel.
Included in the mission were Australian customs and immigration personnel, consular and foreign service officers, along with Afghan contractors and interpreters who assisted ADF troops.
Defence Minister Peter DuttonĀ has told nine the Australian government are trying to rescue more people, but evacuations are incredibly dangerous.
“There is no sense pretending that you can get to the airport easily. There are checkpoints on each approach to the airport and we have an operation that is underway at the moment”– Peter Dutton
Mr Dutton, confirmed they are trying to get as many back safely to Australia as possible, but that it is a “very difficult situation”.
Meantime, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said they are working alongside the WA government delivering medical and mental health support for the passengers.
“This has been a difficult and distressing ordeal for many of the evacuees and we will help them through completing the mandatory 14-day quarantine”– PM Scott Morrison
WA are taking in the evacuees in addition to their weekly quarantine quota, while other states have been asked to help out as more Australian visa holders from Afghan are delivered safely to home soil.
With more Afghan nationals holding Australian visas in line to be evacuated the Prime Minister has committed to resettling 3000 Afghans on humanitarian visas.
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