The Croatian oil company INA said on Monday that 77 workers of its affiliate Crosco were currently in Libya and that it was arranging for the evacuation of all the workers as soon as possible.
Croatian companies Geofizika, Montmontaza and Adria-Mar Shipbuilding have also announced the withdrawal of their workers from the country, which has been affected by anti-government protests for several days.
INA said that the 77 Crosco workers were posted at several locations -- 18 in Tripoli, 26 outside Kufra and 33 at two installations in the Jalo area.
"We are in close contact with site managers and project leaders at all the locations and we believe that the evacuation will be carried out soon," INA said.
Geofizka said it had decided to temporarily suspend the operations in Libya and organise the return of its 36 workers to Croatia. The first group of workers is due to leave the country on Monday while the second group will depart on regular flights from Tripoli for Zagreb via Vienna, Frankfurt or Rome.
Geofizika said that its workers were not in danger and that they had received no threats.
"The return of the remaining 73 workers will be organised depending on developments. They are safe for now because they work at locations in the desert, near the city of Zillah, where there are no protests and which are far away from places of conflict," Geofizika's security adviser Zeljko Dosen told media.
Dosen said that Geofizika was coordinating its actions with the Croatian Foreign Ministry and was in close contact with the Croatian Embassy in Tripoli.
Montmontaza said in a statement it had hired a plane which was waiting in Zagreb for permission from the Libyan authorities to land in Benghazi, the site of bloody clashes between anti-government protesters and security forces.
"The situation on the ground is changing by the hour. We are in close contact with our workers in Benghazi and the Croatian Embassy in Tripoli and are doing all we can to evacuate our workers from Benghazi safely," Montmontaza said.
Adria-Mar Shipbuilding said it planned to return seven of its workers to Croatia later this month and to keep the remaining three in Tripoli where it was assessed they were not in danger.
The Croatian Foreign Ministry has set up a crisis management centre to coordinate the evacuation of Croatian citizens together with their companies.
The ministry said that about 500 Croatian citizens were currently in Libya, of whom about 380 were hired by Croatian companies and about 50 by foreign companies, while the rest had dual citizenship.
