Ship evacuates nearly 150 Brazilians from Libya

BRASILIA: A ship carrying 148 Brazilian evacuees and workers from several other nations departed Saturday from Libya's rebel-held port city of Benghazi bound for Greece, Brazil's foreign ministry said.

"The ship had arrived Thursday in Benghazi seeking authorization to dock, which it received on Friday. The boat sailed on Saturday and will arrive early Sunday in the Greek port of Piraeus," a ministry spokesman told AFP.

Most Brazilian citizens in Libya who wished to leave the country because of the revolt against the regime of Moamer Kadhafi have now been evacuated, according to the ministry.

This past week saw five aircraft chartered by private Brazilian firms fly into violence-plagued Tripoli to evacuate most of their staff from the Libyan capital.

A skeleton crew of Brazilian diplomatic staff and employees from Brazilian firms remained, largely to coordinate with any of their workers or citizens who stayed behind.

Before the start of unrest there were between 500 and 600 Brazilians living in Libya, where several construction firms from South America's largest nation have major operations.