Coronavirus Update: Pakistan Halts Flights To China, While Some Citizens Remain Stranded

Pakistan suspended flights to and from China on Friday as the death toll from the coronavirus exceeded 210 and almost 10,000 people have been infected.

"We are suspending flights to China until Feb. 2," Senior Joint Secretary of Aviation Abdul Sattar Khokhar said, adding that officials will review the situation after that date.

On Thursday, Pakistan International Airlines, or PIA, the national flag carrier, decided on its own to suspend flights to Beijing until Feb 2.

PIA had commenced two flights a week to Tokyo and Beijing in May 2019.

However, Pakistan has not yet evacuated its citizens still in China.

On Thursday, the Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr. Zafar Mirza said the government decided not to repatriate Pakistanis stranded in China under recommendations of the World Health Organization.

"We believe that right now, it is in the interest of our loved ones in China [to stay there]. It is in the larger interest of the region, world, country that we don't evacuate them now," he said. "This is what the World Health Organization is saying, this is China's policy and this is our policy as well. We stand by China in full solidarity.”

Mirza added: "Right now the government of China has contained this epidemic in Wuhan city. If we act irresponsibly and start evacuating people from there, this epidemic will spread all over the world like wildfire."

Foreign Office Spokesperson Aaisha Farooqui said: “Islamabad has taken up the issue of food shortages with concerned officials and we are assured by the Chinese government of full cooperation in this regard.”

Mirza also assured that the Pakistani Embassy in Beijing was in contact with Pakistani citizens and that the Islamabad government is confident that the Chinese have adequate policies to contain the virus.

Mirza earlier announced that four Pakistani students in China were diagnosed with the virus. An estimated 500 Pakistani students currently reside in Wuhan, the epicenter of the virus.

Farooqui said of the students stuck in Wuhan: “Islamabad is monitoring the evolving situation and will take a decision after consultations among all the stakeholders.”

On Friday, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi spoke to his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, to discuss the crisis.

Yi told Qureshi the Chinese government was giving all possible assistance to the Pakistani community and "facilitating them like its own citizens.”

Qureshi thanked the Chinese for paying "special attention" to the Pakistani community in China.

"Pakistani people and government are standing with the Chinese government and people in this difficult hour," Qureshi said.

But opposition lawmaker Senator Raza Rabbani has demanded the government evacuate Pakistanis stranded in China and be returned in a special plane.

Rabbani also accused the government of failing to share information with the families of citizens trapped in China.

Rear Admiral Jamil Akhtar told Geo News on Thursday that the Karachi Port Trust will quarantine Chinese ship personnel who deliver goods there. Akhtar added that containers arriving from China would be thoroughly checked, and the ships’ staff would not be able to go outside the port area.

In fiscal 2019, Pakistan’s total bilateral trade volume with China amounted to about $15.6 billion

Meanwhile, some 150 Pakistanis are stranded in an airport in the far western region of Xinjiang in China. The Pakistanis, mostly students and their families, have been stuck at the airport in Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.

These people cannot leave the airport due to expired visas, nor can they fly home as Pakistan has halted flights to China.

Tariq Rauf, a scholar from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa who was studying in China, told Dawn newspaper by video: "For how long will we stay here?" Rauf added that the Pakistanis are running out of money and some are accompanied by small children and elderly relatives.

"We request the Pakistani government to evacuate us from here ... this is our constitutional right," he said.

Rauf also assured that none of the stranded Pakistanis had contracted the coronavirus and that Urumqi is very far (2,000 miles) from Wuhan.