The national flag carrier today started its commercial flight to Narita in Japan today ignoring the Supreme Court’s order. The apex court has directed the government to halt air service to and from coronavirus infected countries in the wake of global pandemic.
The NAC flight to Narita – carrying some 234 passengers from Nepal – flew to Narita today and returned with 265 passengers. A jumbo team of government officials travelled to Narita on its inaugural flight. The Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation had announced yesterday that no formal programme would be conducted during the inaugural flight on the Kathmandu-Narita route.
Nepal Airlines Corporation spokesperson Archana Khadka defended the decision to go ahead with the Narita flight. “The corporation had been working to launch commercial flight on this route for a very long time and tickets were already booked for the inaugural flight,” she said, adding that the corporation had not received any objection letter or notice regarding flight operations to Japan. “However, the NAC will halt flights after receiving formal order from the apex court.”
NAC has started its commercial flights to Narita, shifting its service from Osaka as Narita is economically more viable than Osaka. NAC had halted flights to Osaka on February 27.
Meanwhile, the Home Ministry has directed all the concerned authorities to suspend the on-arrival visa issuance to passengers travelling from five countries including China, South Korea, Japan, Iran and Italy from March 10.
No comments:
Post a Comment