Iran<\/a> on Saturday and the retaliatory strikes that followed.<\/p>\nServices from Dubai have gradually resumed, with the first direct flight to Dublin scheduled to take off at 6pm Dubai time and land shortly after 10pm Irish time.<\/p>\n
Speaking on Newstalk, foreign affairs minister Helen McEntee confirmed that about 400 passengers will travel on the first Emirates flight to Dublin.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the last few days, there have been a limited number of flights that are taking off, and, as you can imagine, they’re going to every part of the world,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re not the only people trying to get our citizens out. We have, over the past few days, had a number of people who have been able to get to London or to Berlin or to other parts of Europe.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we now have confirmation, having been engaging with the airlines, that there will be a direct flight to Dublin today.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat flight will have up to, if not a little bit more than, 400 people on it. That’s obviously a really positive development, and we are pushing for more direct flights to Dublin.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully, if it continues as is, so the airspace continues to allow these flights to get out, we would hope that more people would be able to get on those flights, and that we will have more direct flights to Dublin.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ms McEntee said airlines are prioritising passengers stuck in transit in the Middle East or holidaying in the region.<\/p>\n
Ms McEntee also confirmed the Government has signed a contract for a charter flight from Oman to bring Irish citizens back to Dublin on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The flight is expected to carry 280 people who registered with the Irish Embassy in the UAE. Passengers will make a six- to eight-hour bus journey to Oman before boarding.<\/p>\n
Ms McEntee said the charter flight would prioritise the most vulnerable and described it as the \u201cfirst of many\u201d if required.<\/p>\n
She confirmed that Irish citizens travelling on the charter flight from Oman to Dublin will have to pay a charge.<\/p>\n
It is understood the charge will apply to anyone aged 16 and over, with passengers paying \u20ac800 each.<\/p>\n
One Government source said the fee aligns with previous repatriation flights organised by the Department of Foreign Affairs during the covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n
The source said the Government is covering some of the cost of the flight.<\/p>\n
Individuals who express interest in taking the charter will be asked to pay the costs via PayPal, with an invoice being sent directly from the Government.<\/p>\n
While passengers will pay for the flight, there will be no charge for the bus journey to Oman, Ms McEntee added.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, if there are people in significant difficulty, we will support them. Wee will make sure that they can get on the flight if they need to get home and we can work with them beyond that,\u201d Ms McEntee said.<\/p>\n
She said the quickest way for Irish people to return home remains on commercial flights, with airlines contacting travellers directly.<\/p>\n
Ms McEntee said that if the war is ongoing when Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin visits the White House in two weeks, he will stress that \u201cwe have to get people back around the table\u201d to de-escalate and end the conflict in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
She added: \u201cBack around the table might sound soft, but that is the only option here. This is the only way that this is resolved and that people find a way forward, because anything other than that just creates further instability.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A further 400 people are expected to fly from Dubai to Dublin tomorrow, as foreign affairs Minister Helen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328912,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5658,4712,42,11829,1196,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-328911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-irish-examiner-instagram","tag-israel-palestine","tag-headlines","tag-iran","tag-middle-east","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328911"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328911\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}