In a surprising tone, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) scheduled four flights to the Tribhuwan International Airport (TIA), Kathamndu from Bhadrapur, Saturday, unlike what the US Embassy in Kathmandu reported about “temporary hold” yesterday.
According to reports, IOM made urgent calls to all returnees on Friday evening to get ready for Saturday morning and accordingly they were flown to TIA.
“Refugees of the first two flights have reached the here,” a resettling refugee from the IOM transit camp in Kathmandu told Bhutan News Service. “According to them, other two flights have been scheduled for this afternoon.”
Meanwhile, it is learnt that even refugees at the IOM transit at Bansbari of Kathmandu were informed of their probable return to camps yesterday.
“I cried so much when we were told that we’ll be taken back to camps,” a mother of two children told BNS.
According to this lady, she was brought to Kathmandu only nine months after she completed her orientation class. “Today, again we were informed that our flight schedule to America remains intact.”
Our camp correspondents reported that most of the cyber cafes remained occupied until late evening yesterday. There were huge crowds in cyber cafes and telephone booths Saturday morning.
“I thought that I would remain forever in the camp. I also saw several people crying over the shocking news in cyber cafes this morning,” Radhikar Sharma of Beldangi-II told BNS.
Citing “revision in the screening procedures”, the US Government on Friday instructed the IOM to cancel scheduled flights to Kathmandu.
Meanwhile, BNS was unable to reach for official comment from the Embassy or UN officials regarding the resumption of the process as today happened to be Saturday.
