Skip to main content

Pakistan to close Chaman border with Afghanistan from tomorrow

Coronavirus, Afghan border

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has announced to close Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan amid apprehensions of outbreak of the novel coronavirus, ARY News reported on Sunday.

The government has issued a letter with regard to closure of the Pak-Afghan border crossing at Chaman in the first phase.

Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan will remain closed from March 02 (Monday) for seven days, according to a notification of the Ministry of Interior.

The Chaman border crossing will remain closed for seven days in the first phase, the order said. The decision has been taken in view to avoid the outbreak of novel coronavirus, the letter said.

The porous border with Afghanistan is a cause of concern for Pakistan after the new coronavirus erupted in neighbouring Iran.

Islamabad has closed its border crossings with Iran while Kabul has also suspended all travel to the country, which has reported 43 deaths out of nearly 543 infections — making it one of the hardest hit countries outside the virus epicentre China.

Afghanistan announced its first virus infection on last Monday involving a patient who had recently been in Iran where millions of Afghans live.

The virus has spread to more than 25 countries, killing over 2,835 and infecting 85,000, mostly in China. But new outbreaks in Europe, the Middle East and in Asia have fanned fears of the contagion taking hold in poor nations which lack the healthcare infrastructure to cope.

The post Pakistan to close Chaman border with Afghanistan from tomorrow appeared first on ARY NEWS.



from ARY NEWS https://ift.tt/2PRefYX

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

IT ministry forms panel to review social media rules

ISLAMABAD: While uproar against the new rules to regulate social media continues from various segments of society, including parliamentarians, the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) and civil society, the information technology ministry on Friday formed a committee to review the rules. The federal cabinet approved the rules on Feb 11, but later after opposition from various quarters, including companies that manage different social media platforms, the prime minister announced that a fresh consultation process would be launched over the Citizens Protection (Against Online Harm) Rules 2020. The committee formed by the IT ministry is headed by Pakistan Telecommunication Authority Chairman Amir Azeem Bajwa while its members are Eazaz Aslam Dar, additional secretary of IT; Tania Aidrus, member of the Strategic Reforms Imple­mentation Unit, Prime Minister Office; and Dr Arslan Khalid, focal person on digital media at the PM Office. Federal Minister for Human Rights Dr Shireen Ma

Young girl’s tragic story makes her symbol of Yemen war

Buthaina Mansur al-Rimi’s life has changed drastically since last year — orphaned in Sanaa, the little girl controversially ended up in Saudi Arabia for medical care and has just returned to Yemen’s capital. Her entire immediate family was wiped out in an air strike by a Saudi-led coalition that backs Yemen’s government, using an explosive device Amnesty International says was made in the US. Images of Buthaina’s rescue and a picture of her swollen and bruised at a hospital trying to force open one of her eyes with her fingers were beamed worldwide. That international fame saw her become something of a propaganda pawn in the war between Yemen’s Iran-backed Huthi rebels and Saudi media. “I was in my mother’s room with my father, sisters, brother and uncle, the first missile hit, and my father went to get us sugar to get over the shock, but then the second missile hit, and then the third,” she says. “And then the house fell,” adds the little girl, who says she is eight. It was the