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‘Garbage on tarmac’: Pak state-run airlines on reason behind suspending flight operations to Afghanistan
The PIA said that it ‘temporarily suspended’ operations due to lack of facilities and ‘heaps of garbage’ on the tarmac of Hamid Karzai International Airport.
Pakistan temporarily suspended flights operations with Kabul and put a halt on the evacuation process, according to news agencies Geo News and PTI. The state-run Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) was the sole commercial airline which carried out evacuation operations helping diplomats and foreign nationals from Afghanistan exit the country after the Taliban took control of the nation last week.
The PIA said that it ‘temporarily suspended’ operations due to lack of facilities and ‘heaps of garbage’ on the tarmac of Hamid Karzai International Airport. People familiar with the developments also told Geo News that there were no security personnel or immigration officials at the Kabul airport. Workers with the sanitation department also were absent from their duties following the takeover by the Taliban. The people familiar with the developments said that the ‘authorities were afraid that garbage at the airport’s tarmac could lead to a tragic accident’.
The PIA spokesperson Abdullah Hafeez told news agency Radio Pakistan that the PIA temporarily suspended its flight operations to Afghanistan due to lack of necessary facilities at Kabul airport. “We have talked to the Afghan Civil Aviation Authority for restoration of all required facilities at Kabul airport as soon as possible so that PIA could resume its flight operation,” Hafeez was quoted as saying by Radio Pakistan.
He said that the PIA has evacuated 1,500 people, including journalists, UN officials and Pakistani nationals, in five flights.
Chaotic scenes unfurled over the last two weeks in Kabul airport as several Afghan citizens struggled to get out of Afghanistan in a bid to escape the Taliban takeover. People in the war-torn country were reminded of the regressive regime of the Taliban between 1996-2001 following their hostile takeover of the country.
