Pakistani ambassador heads home, leaving hundreds stranded in Yemen

KARACHI: While hundreds of Pakistanis remain stranded in war-torn Yemen, the Pakistani ambassador to the Gulf state and his staff returned home, leaving expats in a state of confusion as their evacuation without a diplomatic mission becomes more difficult.

Speaking from Aden by telephone, a Pakistani expat Tauqeer Ahmed said that with the return of the embassy staff, the Pakistani community in Yemen is voluntarily helping coordinate amongst their own people.

“Obviously, we are facing a lot of difficulty. If a government official was here, things would have been more organised and more resources would have been employed to bring people together. Right now, volunteers are doing the work of the officials.”

Around 2,000 Pakistanis are said to be stranded in Yemen, while 503 people, including the Pakistani Ambassador to Yemen and his embassy staff, were brought back by a special PIA flight late on Sunday.

Read: First PIA aircraft carrying stranded Pakistanis from Yemen arrives in Karachi

Ahmed, who works for an oil terminal and lubricant manufacturing company, said he could hear the noise of tanks and rockets in surrounding areas of the airport.

He, along with six other fellow Pakistanis, is currently living in his office, which, they feel, is a secure place. “So far, I am in the free-zone but God knows when things can go wrong and the rebels can come here,” he said.

Ahmed, who has been living in Aden for the last four years, has compiled a list of 150 Pakistanis present there.

When contacted by The Express Tribune, the Pakistani Ambassador to Yemen Dr Irfan Yousuf Shami, who returned home on Sunday, hung up and failed to respond.

Meanwhile, foreign office spokesperson Tasnim Aslam said they had coordinators and focal points in Yemen, and their crisis management cell in Islamabad was coordinating.

But her statement offered little solace to those stranded in the war-torn country and their families. People like Talha, whose sister Romana Hafeez along with her four children and paralyzed husband, are stranded in Yemeni Capital Sana’a, are willing to take any risk to save their loved ones.

Read: Yemen war: Clock ticking for stranded families

“The embassy staff should have stayed there till everyone came back. I am willing to go and save people there as I have worked in conflict-hit areas.”

The embassy made arrangements for the 503 people in Sana’a who returned to Pakistan. “Those people were helped by the embassy, but now, people who are stuck there, they don’t know who to coordinate with and what to do,” Talha added.

Prisoners stuck in Yemen

The return of the embassy staff has also increased problems for those Pakistanis incarcerated in Yemen.

“If the prisoners are released before completing jail time, they are handed over to the embassy. But now, who will receive them? Who will verify them and issue travel documents to them?” said activist Ansar Burney. According to him, there are 20 Pakistani prisoners in two jails of Sana’a, including 11 fishermen.

Mohammad Siddique is one such fisherman who has been languishing in Sana’a Jail for the last nine years. His brother Abdul Sattar, who lives in Lyari, has appealed to the government to bring him back. “The ambassador left everyone and rescued himself first. My brother’s life is in danger and rebels are trying to kill him,” Sattar told The Express Tribune.

Some expats whose passports are in the possession of their employers are also facing problems due to the closure of the Pakistani embassy in Yemen. If the embassy was functioning, it could have issued them papers which would have brought them back home, said Burney.