No Georgian victims reported at Ataturk Airport:
About 120 passengers are safe

Georgia is cooperating with airlines to get Georgian citizens that are stuck in Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport back home as soon as possible.

Georgia’s Vice Prime Minister and Economy Minister Dimitry Kumsishvili said this afternoon that no Georgian citizens were injured in last night’s attack.

He said about 120 Georgian citizens were at the airport when the three blasts happened and all of them were taken to hotels by Georgia’s General Consulate in Istanbul with help from the Turkish side.

A Georgian citizen posted on Facebook that she was now safe at an Istanbul hotel. 

Right now we are working with airline companies to get our citizens back to Georgia as soon as possible,” Kumsishvili said.

Georgia’s General Consul Irakli Asashvili said all Georgians who were at the airport were now safe and waiting in nearby hotels.

We went to see our citizens at the airport. Some of them called us via our hotline but we found it more efficient to go there and personally see our citizens,” Asashvili said.

Some of them were taken out of the airport by buses provided by the Turkish government and the rest were evacuated by our Consulate’s cars.”

The Consul said upon the order by Georgia’s Prime Minister, Georgian citizens who had no money with them had their hotel costs covered by the Georgian Government. Asashvili said this number of such citizens was about 65.

Last night all five flights between Tbilisi and Istanbul were cancelled. This afternoon Ataturk Airport returned to normal operations and today’s flights will be carried out to and from Tbilisi as scheduled.

Georgia released hotline numbers for its citizens in Turkey:

• (+90 312) 690-30-40) – Embassy of Georgia to the Republic of Turkey, Ankara;
• (+90 541) 818 44 00 – Consulate General of Georgia in Istanbul;
• (+90 541) 326-22-26 - Consulate General of Georgia in Trabzon;
• (+995) 577 98 40 20 – Georgia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Tbilisi.