Behind evacuation of students from Ukraine’s Sumy, 2 back-to-back calls by PM Modi

After the attempt to relocate Sumy students failed on Monday, the crisis escalated to its highest level and PM Modi had a big role in clearing the way for the students.

What set the ball rolling for the final evacuation of about 700 Indians from Sumy in north-eastern Ukraine after days of nerve-wracking negotiations, was Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two separate phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday.

After the attempt to relocate Sumy students failed on Monday, the crisis escalated to its highest level and PM Modi had a big role in clearing the way for the students.

“In both calls, the leaders gave their green signal and told the Prime Minister that they did not have a problem with safe passage,” an official, who was privy to the developments that led to the evacuation effort on Tuesday, was quoted by The Indian Express.

Sources said the calls between the leaders gave the initiative a “final push”, and the decks were cleared after officials in Moscow and Kyiv got instructions to create a “humanitarian corridor”.

The students had sent out SOS videos amid heavy shelling and gunfire in Sumy, but Indian officials were unable to organise safe passage for them. The students said they had run out of food and water and even threatened to start leaving the city on their own.

“It was a complicated and dangerous situation,” news agency ANI quoted an official as saying. After the first attempt to shift them failed on Monday, the crisis was escalated to the highest levels, the official told ANI.

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External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar worked the phone lines, too, while Defence Ministry officials reached out to their counterparts and two Indian ambassadors — Pavan Kapoor in Moscow and Partha Satpathy in Kiev — liaised with top officials in the two capitals.

The Red Cross in Geneva was also contacted, and they alerted their unit in Ukraine, which helped with some of the arrangements.

Several phone calls were made, and messages exchanged before the final green signal came through about midnight on Monday, even as the students were asked to stay away from social media — no tweets, no posts on Instagram.