Kuwait-bound Bangladeshi travellers in trouble over coronavirus health clearance

Uncertainty now looms over the journey of many of the passengers, who have received visa and booked tickets accordingly, due to bureaucratic complexities at Kuwait Embassy in Dhaka and the government’s disease control agency IEDCR, the lone body that conducts coronavirus test in Bangladesh.

In a move aimed at controlling the rapid spread of the disease at home, Kuwait’s civil aviation authority said on Tuesday passengers from 10 nations, including Bangladesh, must produce certificates issued by the Kuwaiti embassy in their country saying they are coronavirus-free.

On Wednesday, the embassy handed all visa applicants a form for coronavirus test, but the IEDCR said it received no instructions on conducting the tests on people who do not show symptoms.

Hundreds of Bangladeshis, mostly migrant workers who returned home on holidays, demonstrated outside the IEDCR at Mohakhali on Thursday against its refusal to test and certify them.

One of them, Zahangir Hossain, told bdnews24.com he would suffer a loss of at least Tk 40,000 if his ticket is cancelled due to a delay in getting the certificate.

At least 1,000 Bangladeshis travel to Kuwait daily by direct and indirect flights, according to the expatriates.

Meerjady Sabrina Flora, the director at the IEDCR, said they had informed the health ministry about the issue.

“We are also talking to the Kuwait embassy, who said they had sent a letter to the foreign ministry. Maybe the foreign ministry will tell our ministry which will make a decision,” she said.

“But giving certificates to the Kuwait-bound passengers is an administrative matter, not epidemiology. Our duty is to conduct surveillance and detect coronavirus patients. A person showing no symptoms does not need coronavirus test,” she added.