UK rescue plane arrives in Libya

William Hague: “We’ve also deployed staff to Libya’s border with Tunisia”

The Foreign Office has chartered three planes to bring Britons home from Libya, but the first has been delayed because of a “minor technical fault”.

The delay will fuel criticism of the speed of the government’s response to the violent uprising in the North African country.

The Royal Navy frigate HMS Cumberland is to arrive off Libyan waters later.

About 300 Britons remain in the Tripoli area, and 170 British oil workers are stranded in desert camps.

Foreign Secretary William Hague said the government would send “as many planes as necessary” to bring Britons home.

He said the oil workers were in a “perilous and frightening” situation and Britain was working with other countries to ensure their safety.

One worker told the BBC they were being “ignored” by the government. He said all the vehicles had been looted and local people were heavily armed, and the camp only had about a day’s food left.

Other countries, including France, Russia and the Netherlands have already evacuated some of their citizens.

BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner said it was “mind boggling” how slow Britain had been to react to the Libyan crisis which started a week ago.

“The French have been sending planes, the Germans, the Turks, other countries have been getting their people out and the British haven’t even got their plane off the ground,” he said.

One UK plane, chartered by oil company BP, has arrived in Libya. It left at 1415 GMT with some Foreign Office officials on board. Boarding priority on the return journey is expected to be given to BP’s employees.

The first Foreign Office-flight, operated by Astraeus Airlines, was due to take off from Gatwick at 1230 GMT, but was still waiting to take-off in the late afternoon. It can take 180 passengers.

The second flight is due to take off later on Wednesday and a third will leave on Thursday morning if needed.

Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt said: “Sometimes planes develop faults through nobody else’s fault or error. We will hopefully get those planes out as quickly as possible.”

Mr Hague said sending in military planes without permission would risk the safety of all those involved but it had not been ruled out.

The foreign secretary said the Foreign Office had deployed several rapid response teams to the country, and there were 50 people in the London office taking calls from Britons.

Foreign Office staff are at Tripoli airport and they have been registering Britons for the flights, as well as handing out food and water. More than 100 Britons have signed up for seats on the first flight.

Staff have also been deployed to Libya’s border with Tunisia to help Britons who have made their way there.

UK nationals wishing to register an interest in the first flight should call the following numbers: 020 7008 0000 from the UK or 021 3403644/45.

Although most of the 3,500 Britons who were living in Libya before the crisis are thought to have already left, some are having difficulty getting out after commercial operators cancelled scheduled flights.

British Airways and British Midland International have cancelled flights in and out of Tripoli for the past two days. BA will not operate its daily service on Thursday and BMI said it will make a decision on this later.

Speaking in Qatar, Prime Minister David Cameron said diplomats were “working round the clock” to help British nationals out of what was a “very dangerous situation”.

“My government is taking every step it can to reach British nationals to make sure they can come out and come home,” he said. “That has to be our first priority.”

Most of the Britons in the isolated desert camps work for oil companies. They are struggling to make contact because the phone networks have been disrupted and their supplies from Libyan cities are running out.

“Some we know have been subjected to attacks and looting,” said Mr Hague. “They are in a perilous and frightening situation.”

Stranded oil worker Jim Coyle told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “We are living every day in fear of our lives. We are living a nightmare here.”

He said the workers had contacted British officials to warn them about the situation but nothing had happened.

“We have asked the British government to come here for days now and they are just totally ignoring us,” he said.

“They don’t reply to e-mails, they have cut off the phones to Tripoli. Basically we have been left without any protection whatsoever.”

Chris Murphy and his wife arrived back in the UK on Wednesday afternoon. He said they had “fought their way” through crowds to get on the flight at Tripoli airport but when the plane took off, there were about 100 empty seats.

Dutch nationals were evacuated on a military plane on Tuesday

A British woman said she and a Portuguese friend were helped out of the country by Portuguese embassy staff on Tuesday.

“There was nothing at all happening with the British Embassy. We felt very isolated and very out there on our own,” the unidentified woman told BBC Radio 4’s The World At One.

Shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander accused the UK government of being “slow off the mark”.

“There are hundreds of Britons stranded in Libya at the moment in a daunting, fast-moving and highly dangerous situation,” he said.

After a week of upheaval in Libya, protesters backed by defecting army units are thought to have almost the entire eastern half of Libya under their control.

The country’s beleaguered leader Col Muammar Gaddafi, who has been in power for 42 years, has said enemies of Libya would be executed and vowed to fight to his “last drop of blood” rather than leave the country.

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