English Section

UPDATE: Poles return from Middle East as conflict disrupts travel

05.03.2026 20:30
More than 2,200 people have returned to Poland from the Middle East amid an escalating regional conflict, the foreign ministry said on Thursday, with military aircraft expected to bring home more evacuees overnight.
The Polish foreign ministry building in Warsaw.
The Polish foreign ministry building in Warsaw.Photo: PAP/Radek Pietruszka

Foreign ministry spokesman Maciej Wewiór said 2,263 passengers had arrived in Poland aboard 11 flights by midweek.

Two military aircraft were expected to land in Warsaw in the early hours of Friday, carrying 110 passengers requiring medical assistance, he added.

The passengers travelled by bus from the United Arab Emirates to the airport in Muscat, the capital of Oman. Polish consuls accompanied them during the journey to help facilitate the border crossing, Wewiór said.

The buses were organised by consular officials with support from a Polish state-owned company, he added.

He said there were no reports of any Polish citizens hurt in the fighting in the Middle East.

According to the spokesman, airspace over the United Arab Emirates has begun reopening gradually, allowing up to 40,000 tourists to leave the country each day.

If the security situation remains stable, the tourist backlog could be cleared within about a week, he said.

If airspace continues to reopen, up to 100 flights per day could operate, Wewiór told reporters, adding that Polish authorities were working to ensure that as many of those flights as possible connect to Poland.

He said a crisis team met on Thursday at the foreign ministry in Warsaw under the leadership of Sports and Tourism Minister Jakub Rutnicki to review the situation, including developments in countries outside the Persian Gulf and Arabian Peninsula.

He added that only a handful of Polish citizens still wished to leave Israel, while no Poles in Lebanon or Jordan had requested evacuation.

Wewiór said a consular official in Dubai remained available around the clock and that a special hotline launched on Sunday for Poles in the Middle East had received more than 3,000 calls.

He appealed for the line to be used only by those in need of assistance, saying some callers had posed as journalists and attempted to record or test the service.

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced he had decided to deploy military aircraft to support the evacuation.

President Karol Nawrocki, who serves as commander-in-chief of Poland's armed forces, approved the use of a Polish military contingent to assist with evacuations from Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, Israel, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and the United Arab Emirates.

Under the decision, up to 150 troops may be deployed between March 5 and March 31 to assist in evacuating Polish citizens, particularly those requiring medical support.

The evacuations follow attacks by the United States and Israel on Iran on February 28 and subsequent retaliatory strikes by Tehran, which prompted many airlines to cancel flights across the region.

Polish airline LOT plans special flights from Sri Lanka, Maldives

Meanwhile, Poland’s national carrier LOT said it would offer special return flights for tourists from Sri Lanka and the Maldives in partnership with several travel agencies.

These special flights from Colombo to Warsaw and from Male to Warsaw are scheduled for March 10.

The airline said limited seats could also be made available for individual travellers, depending on availability, with tickets sold through authorised agents.

Earlier this week, LOT extended the suspension of some Middle East routes. Flights to Dubai are cancelled through March 6, while connections to Riyadh are suspended through March 8.

Flights to Tel Aviv remain suspended until March 18.

(gs)

Source: IAR, PAP