Special aircraft on evacuation mission from Tehran arrives in KLIA

The special flight carrying Malaysian nationals from Tehran, Iran, one of the countries which have been severely infected by the COVID-19 outbreak, arrived safely at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) in Sepang early today.

The AirAsia flight chartered specifically for the Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) mission initiated by the Malaysian government landed at 6.35 am, according to the National Disaster Management Agency.

An earlier report said a total of 46 individuals, including children, who had registered with the Malaysian Embassy in Tehran were brought home in the special flight which departed from Tehran last night.

All those brought home would have to undergo health screening at the Air Disaster Unit (ADU) at KLIA, just as how it was done in the first two HADR missions from Wuhan, China in February.

Yesterday, Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Kamarudin Jaffar said the AirAsia flight had departed for Tehran to bring back Malaysian stranded in Iran as a result of high-level discussions undertaken between all governments concerned in a spirit of ASEAN togetherness.

-- BERNAMA