COVID-19: Hundreds of Kuwait-bound Egyptians stranded
Since Kuwait imposed flight ban in August, they have shifted to transit in a third country
Cairo: Hundreds of Egyptian expatriates, heading to Kuwait, are being stranded in other countries after the Gulf state this week suspended international flights due to concerns over a new coronavirus variant, an Egyptian official has said.
Kuwait Monday announced closing its borders and temporarily halting international flights until January 1.
Egyptian Minister of Migration Nabila Makram said that her ministry had received 1,450 pleas for help from Egyptians stuck abroad after the Kuwaiti measures.
They are being stranded in the UAE, Turkey and Oman where they were on transit flights after Kuwait in August banned flights with dozens of countries including Egypt.
“The ministry has reactivated an operations room to handle the crisis of the stranded Egyptians,” Makram said in media remarks.
She added that travel companies, which had arranged those Egyptians’ flights, will be approached to help in their accommodation.
Since the August ban, Egyptians, wishing to travel to Kuwait, have used transit flights in a third country, including the UAE, where they would go into quarantine for 14 days and do coronavirus-detecting testing before resuming their flights to Kuwait.