The UAE has stopped issuing visas to Pakistani nationals and only narrowly held back from imposing a complete ban on the Pakistani passport, a senior Pakistani interior ministry official told a parliamentary panel on Thursday.Pakistan’s additional interior secretary Salman Chaudhry informed the Senate Functional Committee on Human Rights that both the UAE and Saudi Arabia had “stopped short of imposing a ban on the Pakistani passport,” as reported by Dawn.
“If a ban is imposed, getting it removed would be difficult,” Chaudhry said. Senator Samina Mumtaz Zehri, who chairs the Senate human rights committee, confirmed the interior ministry official’s account in comments to the paper.She said the travel restrictions stemmed from concerns about individuals visiting the UAE and “getting involved in criminal activities”.According to her, the committee was informed that the UAE had largely stopped issuing visas to Pakistani nationals, and that only a limited number had been granted recently, and “after much difficulty”.A Pakistani blue passport is an official travel document reserved for government officials and other eligible personnel, distinguishing it from the standard green passport issued to ordinary citizens.Meanwhile, UAE Ambassador to Pakistan Salem M Salem Al Bawab Al Zaabi briefed Pakistan’s finance minister Muhammad Aurangzeb on Thursday about “major UAE visa facilitation reforms for Pakistanis,” according to a statement from the minister’s office.The statement added that nearly 500 visas were being processed daily at the newly launched UAE Visa Centre in Pakistan, outlining the reforms highlighted by the envoy.Pakistan and the UAE maintain longstanding diplomatic, economic, and cultural ties. The Gulf nation is among Pakistan’s largest trading partners in the region and a key source of remittances, supported by a sizeable Pakistani workforce residing there.However, Pakistani nationals experienced a surge in visa rejections in early July, prompting interior minister Mohsin Naqvi to take up the matter with his UAE counterpart.
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