Hundreds of Nigerians evacuated from Saudi Arabia

ANKARA

Hundreds of Nigerian citizens evacuated from Saudi Arabia due to the coronavirus pandemic arrived in the capital Abuja, said an official on Wednesday.

“We received 292 evacuees stranded in Saudi Arabia yesterday. The Saudi Government transported them to Abuja,” Foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama said in a tweet.

“A large number are nursing mothers and children and they are all comfortably settled in hotels under the mandatory 14 days quarantine.”

Saudi authorities identified around 11,600 Nigerian nationals stranded in the kingdom due to travel restrictions, according to an earlier report by Nigerian news outlet Premium Times.

Nigeria has recorded 6,401 coronavirus cases so far, including 192 deaths, while Saudi Arabia’s overall count is close to 60,000 with over 320 deaths.

The total number of COVID-19 cases in Africa has reached 91,598, according to the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

As per the latest update, 2,912 people, half of them in North Africa, have died of virus-related complications, while recoveries across the continent have stood at 35,808.

Over 29,100 cases have been recorded in North Africa, 25,600 in West Africa, 18,500 in Southern Africa, 9,300 in East Africa, and 9,100 in Central Africa.

Some 1,500 deaths have been counted in North Africa, while the toll have stood at 539 in West Africa, 331 in Southern Africa, 298 in Central Africa, and 277 in East Africa.