Twenty-three more Bangladeshi nationals were evacuated from China’s Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, on Thursday and they are now quarantined in the suburbs of Delhi. 

They were flown to Delhi on Thursday morning by a special Indian Air Force flight with a number of other Indian nationals, said the Indian High Commission in Dhaka.

Bangladesh brought back 312 of its nationals from China on February 1 and the remaining Bangladeshis got registered to return home.

After the first (thermal) screening at the isolation bay at the airport, the new group - 76 Indians and 36 foreign nationals including 8 families and 5 children - were provided with basic facilities required at the centre as done with the previous lot of evacuees.

The group of foreign nationals includes 23 from Bangladesh, six from China, two each from Myanmar and the Maldives, and one each from Madagascar, South Africa and the US.

No-one has been tested with any coronavirus symptoms so far and the expected quarantine period is 14 days plus starting from Thursday.

The quarantine camp in Chhawla in New Delhi was prepared by ITBP in just 48 hours prior to arrival of the first batch from Wuhan on February 1, 2020.

The Bangladesh nationals are quarantined in special facilities, said the High Commission in Dhaka.

State Minister for Foreign Affairs M Shahriar Alam, in a Facebook post, thanked the Indian Air Force for taking onboard 23 Bangladesh citizens from Wuhan city of China.

More than 80,000 people in about 40 countries have been infected with the new coronavirus which emerged in December. More than 2,700 have died. The vast majority remain in China.

Earlier, India expressed willingness to take some Bangladeshi students onboard from Wuhan with Indian nationals upon necessary permission.

Initially, a small group of nine Bangladeshi students along with their Indian friend made a request to the Embassy of India in Beijing seeking their helping hand, a student told UNB.

However, as required by the Chinese authorities, their request needed to be forwarded to Indian Embassy as a diplomatic note by Bangladesh Embassy in Beijing, said the student who wished to remain anonymous.

The diplomatic note from Bangladesh Embassy conveyed their concurrence or no objection to Bangladesh students’ evacuation on board the Indian flight, the student said.

The Bangladesh Embassy also sent a separate diplomatic note to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China conveying the same.

The government of India sent a consignment of medical supplies on board a relief flight to Wuhan to aid and assist China in its efforts against the COVID-19 epidemic.

On its return, the flight had some limited capacity to take on board Indian nationals wishing to return to India from Wuhan, Hubei Province.