Govt facilitating tourists stranded in country

To curb the spread of the second wave of the coronavirus in Nepal the government has imposed prohibitory orders in Kathmandu valley along with other districts across the country. Movement of private and public vehicles has been curtailed except for those delivering essential goods and service and for certain special purposes like hospital visits and funeral rites.

Along with the imposition of the order many foreign tourists who are travelling in different parts of Nepal have been stranded. However, the government has said that all necessary measures are being taken to rescue and bring those tourists to Kathmandu.

In this respect, Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) has formed the Crisis Management and Communication Cell, which will help coordinate and rescue stranded tourists. “The Ministry of Home Affairs is responsible for bringing foreign tourists stranded in various parts of the country to Kathmandu and we are facilitating the process through the cell,” informed TP Bhusal, Media Consultant at NTB.

He also shared that the cell will be facilitating in quarantining air passengers who arrive from India through the air bubble facility. “The Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation has issued a list of hotels for those coming from India and we will be coordinating with the respective hotels to quarantine the travellers,” Bhusal added. “For instance, 62 passengers will be arriving from India today and they will be kept at View Bhrikuti in Godavari,” he mentioned.

During the previous lockdown, there were repatriation flights conducted to evacuate foreigners stranded in the country but at the moment there are not many tourists in the country so there are no plans of conducting such flights, said Bhusal.

Meanwhile, a Pakistani national named Khuram Shahzad got in touch with NepalNews and informed that he was stuck in Nepal as the government had restricted international flights from today till midnight of May 14. “There are 16 foreigners like me who are stuck now due to the restriction on international flights and I am talking about only one hotel where I am staying in Thamel,” he informed.

Shahzad was of the opinion that restricting inbound flights was okay but the government could have allowed flights to depart the country. “I was supposed to fly to Saudi Arabia today and I have fulfilled the 14-day quarantine protocol too but I am stuck now,” he mentioned. “There could be many more foreigners like me who are stranded here.”

However, Prem Subedi, Information Officer at the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA), said that chartered flights can be arranged at the request of the foreigners. He added that the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal has been assigned the responsibility of arranging chartered flights if there are any such requests.

Subedi further said that the ministry has been coordinating with concerned authorities to bring back tourists from various places in the country to Kathmandu. “Most of the tourists at present are mountaineers in the Everest region, so special permission has been granted to keep the Tenzing-Hillary Airport in Lukla open to fly back tourists in the region to Kathmandu,” he shared.

Bhusal of NTB also mentioned that most of the tourists now are climbers who are in the Everest region and the respective travel agencies are coordinating in rescuing them to Kathmandu. He informed that on Wednesday the Home Ministry had brought back 5 Polish nationals from Langtang area, four Ukrainians from Pokhara and two Americans from Lukla.

He further informed that to make sure that tourists do not face problems during such a crisis the tourism board has set up a hotline number, 9851252666, and an email address, crisiscell@ntb.org.np, through which foreigners could get the required information. Tourists in need could also visit the website, www.welcomenepal.com/plan-your-trip/covid-19, for more details, he added.

“We are also utilising the Online Traveller Locator facility to find out details of tourists who are stranded in various parts of the country to rescue them,” said Bhusal.