The Biman Bangladesh Airlines has cancelled its all flights to two United Arab Emirates (UAE) destinations – Dubai and Abu Dhabi – from Thursday (Mar 19), and Singapore from Saturday as per decisions of the two nations amid the pandemic of deadly COVID-19.
“We suspended all flights to Dubai and Abu Dhabi from March 19 to 31 as per the decision of the UAE,” Biman Managing Director and CEO Md Mokabbir Hossain told the media in Dhaka on Thursday.
As per Singapore government’s lockdown measures, he said, Biman’s all flights to Singapore from Dhaka will be suspended from Mar 21 to Apr 3.
The national flag carrier operates 28 weekly flights to the two destinations of the UAE and 14 weekly fights to Singapore.
However, the UAE carriers, including Emirates Airlines, will continue their flight operation to Dhaka to carry only transit passengers to other destinations like the UK, the USA and Canada.
So far, Emirates Airlines didn’t reduce its frequency from Dhaka – all three daily flights on Dubai-Dhaka-Dubai are under full operation carrying the transit passengers to other countries, local officials of the carrier told Thursday.
Earlier, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman suspended all flights with Bangladesh due to the deadly coronavirus while Bangladesh imposed a ban on all travellers from Europe except the UK, till Mar 31.
The ban is also applicable to other nations which restricted Bangladeshis entry to their territories over the coronavirus.
With the Singapore route, Biman has so far forced to suspend its 15 out of 18 international destinations over global outbreak of coronavirus.
Only three destinations – London, Manchester and Bangkok – are still open for Biman to operate.
