BSS-47 313 expatriate workers return from Kuwait

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ZCZC

BSS-47

KUWAIT-DEPORTATION-WORKERS

313 expatriate workers return from Kuwait

DHAKA, May 12, 2020 (BSS) – A total of 313 undocumented Bangladeshi expatriate workers who have been kept at a detention center in Kuwait after getting a general amnesty there in the wake of deadly COVID-19 pandemic arrived here this evening by two separate chartered flights amid the ongoing flight suspension.

“A Kuwait Airways special flight first landed at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA) at 8.00 pm carrying 185 Bangladeshi nationals while another 128 expatriate workers returned from Kuwait by a chartered flight of Jajeera Airways landed around 10.00 tonight, HISA director Group Captain AHM Touhid-ul Ahsan told BSS.

This was the first batch of the deported Bangladeshi workers returned from Kuwait while earlier some other middle-east (ME) countries, including Saudi Arabia and Oman, sent Bangladeshis mostly undocumented expatriates along with some inmates after the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic that forced to curtail jobs of migrant workers employed in the oil-rich nations.

The Kuwait government as like as its neighboring countries also bore the cost of the chartered flights to send back the Bangladeshi nationals.

As per the government decision, after arriving here, all returnee workers would have undergone a medical checkup at the airport and to be sent to 14-day institutional quarantine under the Armed Forces Division (AFD) management.

The returnee expatriate workers received Taka 5,000 on arrival at the airport according to a government decision taken last month.

Besides, the expatriate welfare ministry decided to provide loans varied from Taka 5,00,000 to Taka 7,00,000 upon return of jobless expatriate workers here from different countries amid COVID-19 pandemic to enable them pursue viable economic activities especially in agriculture sector.

Last week, Foreign Minister Dr A K Abdul Momen said that Kuwait government had granted general amnesty to some 4,500 undocumented Bangladeshi nationals and kept them in detention camps there to send them back here.

He said Dhaka had asked the Bangladesh Mission in Kuwait to ensure adequate food supply to Bangladeshi citizens after receiving complaints that the expat workers are not given adequate food at the camps.

“We will bring them back whenever the Kuwait government wants. We have no reason not to receive them (our nationals),” he stated in video message holding an inter-ministerial meeting to discuss on repatriation of Bangladeshi nationals from different countries due to COVID-19.

He also said Dhaka is expecting to receive nearly 29,000 Bangladeshi nationals from the United Arab Emirates, the Maldives, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, Oman and Kuwait in the next couple of weeks.

Confirming that so far 3,695 expatriate Bangladeshis returned home in last three weeks from the ME countries, Momen said, “Among the returnees, large numbers were in the prisons of different ME countries but got general amnesty due to Coronavirus pandemic,” he said.

Earlier, Bangladesh foreign minister urged the OIC countries to give utmost importance on the issue of job retention of domestic and resident migrant workers.

He also proposed to establish an OIC Covid-19 Response and Recovery Fund and urged to engage humanitarian organizations in OIC Member States to provide sufficient financial assistance, medical support to the migrant workers from LDCs and developing countries until the impact of the epidemic is over.

BSS/ASG/TA/MRU/2220hrs