Kuwait-based Afghan workers remain stranded at home

KHOST CITY (Pajhwok): Kuwait-based Afghan workers who have arrived home about a year ago say they are not allowed to travel back to the gulf country due to coronavirus.

They say Kuwaiti officials had told them that they would be allowed to enter the country if the Afghanistan public health and foreign ministries verify that they have been administered Jonson and Jonson Covid-19 vaccine.

Holding a protest gathering here, the workers said if the government did not help them, they would incur hundreds of thousands of afghanis loss.

Irfan Mangal, one of them, said about 16,000 Afghans worked in Kuwait and 5000 of them had arrived home from the country and now they were stranded. He said they had been injected Chinese and Indian vaccine but Kuwait did not accept that.

Another worker, Jan Mohammad, said he returned from Kuwait about one year ago and now he could not travel to Kuwait.

He said they would stage protests in various parts of the country if the government did not provide support to them.

Mohammadullah, another person, said the stranded workers used to renew their visas online which was an expensive process. He said their earnings were in Kuwait and in Afghanistan they had to borrow money from people to renew their visas.

However, health officials say those have been injected Chinese and Indian vaccines, they should not use Jonson and Jonson vaccine as it could harm their health.

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