The Hellenic Navy’s frigate, Salamis, arrived at Piraeus port at 8 a.m. this morning, bringing the 186 people evacuated from conflict-ridden Libya to safety.

Chinese Ambassador Zou Xiaoli was present to welcome the 79 Chinese evacuees. He congratulated the navy and Greek government for their work in bringing the foreigners to safety. A group of Chinese were at the port to welcome the arrival of the frigate with a red banner of thanks to Greece.

The Cypriot Foreign Ministry released an announcement thanking the Greek Foreign Ministry and Hellenic Navy for their aid to Cypriot nationals.

Scenes from the arrival:

The evacuation operation went into effect after Greece decided to follow other western governments and “temporarily suspend” the operation of its embassy in Libya “due to the adverse security conditions prevailing in the country.” Conflicts between rival militias in Libya are the worst since Muammar Gaddafi was ousted.

The rescue operation began early on Friday after Salamis arrived just out of the port of Tripoli. 77 Greeks, 79 Chinese, 12 Cypriots, 10 British people as well as seven Belgians, one Russian and one Albanian were safely evacuated.

Groups of 20-25 evacuees were ferried to the Greek frigate on two Libyan tugboats escorted by members of the Hellenic Navy’s commando unit known as DYK.

Yesterday, Greek Defence Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos congratulated the navy officers involved in the mission in a statement conveyed by the Chief of the Hellenic Navy General Staff, Vice Admiral Evangelos Apostolakis. Mr. Avramopoulos expressed “absolute satisfaction with the immediate readiness and excellent planning and execution of operation Agenor for the safe evacuation of Greek embassy personnel from Libya as well as of Greek and foreign nationals.”

A video with photographs from the rescue mission –

A Euronews update on foreigners abandoning Libya –

Photos from Greece’s rescue mission to Libya

For safety and symbolic reasons the frigate didn’t dock at the port of Tripoli

The boarding of citizens took place with inflatable boats of the Libyan Navy.

Each tugboat was filled with 20-25 people.

A helicopter was used in the mission.

Greek commandos at work in Libya.

Like scenes from a movie…

186 people were evacuated.

The frigate will arrive in Athens in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Greek nationals were transported from the Greek embassy to the port.

Greek-flagged merchant ship Eleftherios Venizelos and navy vessel Promitheus were due to join the operation as the number of requests for assistance to evacuate citizens from Libya rose.