Coronavirus pandemic: Pakistan starts evacuating nationals from UAE
First PIA flight carrying 227 passengers from Dubai and other emirates left for Islamabad on Saturday evening
April 19, 2020
DUBAI: Pakistan began evacuating some of its citizens from the United Arab Emirates on Saturday, after the country threatened to review labor ties with countries refusing to take back their nationals during the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The first Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flight carrying 227 “stranded passengers” from Dubai and other emirates left for Islamabad on Saturday evening, Pakistan’s consulate general in Dubai said in a Twitter post.
It was not clear when other flights would depart. More than 40,000 Pakistanis in the Gulf Arab state have registered with the consulate to return home, two UAE newspapers reported.
Earlier this week, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi had said that the next phase of the repatriation of Pakistanis stranded abroad would begin from Tuesday, April 21.
The foreign minister had told a parliamentary committee overseeing the matter that 39,748 Pakistanis have requested to return home to Pakistan.
In this phase, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) will repatriate more than 1,800 Pakistanis stranded at different destinations around the world due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Read also: UAE to extend visas for Pakistani nationals amid coronavirus outbreak
The UAE and other Gulf states have reported increased infections among low-income migrant workers who live in overcrowded quarters. Some have moved to rehouse them in shuttered schools or dedicated centers, and are trying to arrange flights to repatriate them.
The UAE last week said it would review labor relations with states refusing to evacuate citizens, including those who have lost jobs or been put on leave, after the ambassadors of India and Pakistan said their countries were not yet ready to do so.
PIA said on its website that it would not be able to provide services for inbound flights beyond Islamabad International Airport due to suspension of domestic flights and a lockdown in the country.
Millions of foreign workers, many from Asia, form the backbone of Gulf economies and work in sectors that have been disrupted by the coronavirus outbreak.
The pandemic is also likely to disrupt the significant remittances those workers send back to their home countries.
The total infection count in the six Gulf states has risen steadily to surpass 24,000 with more than 150 deaths despite containment measures such as halting passenger flights, curfews and in several case locking down districts with large populations of low-income expatriate workers.
