Four commercial flights will bring home 420 Malaysian students from strife-torn Egypt today and tomorrow under the ‘Ops Piramid 2' evacuation exercise, said National Security Council (NSC) secretary Mohamed Thajudeen Abdul Wahab.

The first flight, by Emirates airline, carrying eight students from Alexandria, is expected to arrive in Kuala Lumpur at 9.45pm today, he told Bernama in a statement.

Some 365 students from Cairo would be flown home by an AirAsia flight, and they were expected to arrive at 5.25am tomorrow, he said.  

The third flight, also from Cairo, will bring home 45 students by a Singapore Airlines (SIA SQ493) flight which will touch down at 8.05am tomorrow, he said.

Two students will be flown from Cairo by Egypt Air and should land at 6.40pm tomorrow, he added.

Mohamed Thajudeen also said that that an Egypt Air flight ferrying six Malaysian students which departed Cairo last night was expected to reach Kuala Lumpur at 6.40pm today.

Last Tuesday, the government decided to bring home the 3,300 Malaysian students in Egypt by commercial flights after the crisis there worsened.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak had said the safety of Malaysian students in Egypt was a priority and they must immediately be brought back before things got more serious.  

Mohamed Thajudeen flew to Egypt on Aug 19 at the head of an NSC team in charge of evaluating the need for relocation and safety of Malaysians in the strife-torn country.   

- Bernama