An article by Nicolas B\u00e9rub\u00e9 published in La Presse on March 18<\/a>, Canadians Stranded Abroad he quoted “One wonders if we’re going to die here.” In his article, Philippe Plante, a Quebecer, recounted the difficult and anxious situation experienced by the intern of the IYIP deployed by Alternatives in Tunisia. We specified that the only reason why Mr. Plante cannot return is the closure by Tunisia of all its borders.<\/p>\nWe have, of course, informed GAC of the situation and asked them to immediately provide us with information on the steps that will be taken to repatriate Canadians who are abroad. We were counting on the statement by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that Canada is considering chartering special flights to repatriate Canadians and permanent residents.<\/p>\n
Our interns are currently in isolation and informed of protective and public health measures. They rely on the support of the partner organizations that host the interns, who have the mandate to support them in all aspects. We also communicate with them as regularly as possible to ensure that their needs are met.<\/p>\n
Repatriation flights for Canadian citizens and permanent residents are currently being arranged for tomorrow, March 20. We are working hard to ensure that the three IYIP Interns will be able to board these flights from Tunis to Montreal. Travel is further complicated by the curfew that is in place between 6:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. However, we are counting on the collaboration of the airlines and we have great hope that the efforts to bring the interns home will be effective, despite the uncertainty.<\/p>\n
UPDATE (March 20, 2020): We managed to find an Air France repatriation flight leaving at 11:00 a.m. (Tunisian time) for two interns, Philippe Plante and Karine Jean-Baptiste. They are currently in transit in Paris and their return to Montreal is scheduled for tomorrow March 21 on Air Canada.<\/p>\n
FINAL UPDATE (March 25, 2020): Philippe Plante and Karine Jean-Baptiste have returned to Montreal.<\/p>\n
The third intern who was at Ksibet \u00c9l Mediouni, in the Monastir area, will return to Montreal this Friday, March 27. Her repatriation flight is scheduled for 3:00 p.m. Tunisian time .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Last Saturday, March 14, we notified GAC that we would be repatriating our 19 internationally deployed interns from six countries (Ecuador, South Africa, Uganda, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Tunisia) in response to the federal government’s advice to Canadians to return on commercial flights while it was still possible. GAC supported our request. All of our interns […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":2855,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[165],"tags":[],"visibilite":[],"region":[],"class_list":["post-4537","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-communique-en"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/actualite-communique-psij-19032020.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4537"},{"taxonomy":"visibilite","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/visibilite?post=4537"},{"taxonomy":"region","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alternatives.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/region?post=4537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}