Taliban’s Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has written to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation to resume commercial flights to Kabul. The letter is currently under review by the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA), reports ANI. 

India had stopped all commercial flight operations to Kabul post August 15 following Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan. The request comes two days after Taliban’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that all problems at Kabul airport have been resolved and the airport is full operational. 

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In a letter addressed to the DGCA chief, Afghanistan’s Acting Minister for Civil Aviation and Transport Hamidullah Akhundzada wrote: “The intention of this letter is to keep smooth passenger movement between two countries based on the signed MoU and our national carriers (Ariana Afghan Airline and Kam Air) aimed to commence their scheduled flights. Therefore, Afghanistan Civil Aviation Authority requests you to facilitate their commercial flights,” according to an Indian Express report. 

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In the letter, Akhundzada goes on to explain how the Kabul Airport was rendered dysfunctional by American troops before their withdrawal and how Qatar helped Afghanistan get its airport functional again. 

The Afghanistan airport was declared ‘uncontrolled’ and was effectively closed for civilian flights from August 16. Since then, the Taliban government in Afghanistan took help of the Qatar government to get the airport up and running again. 

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“The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan assures all airlines of its full cooperation and expects all airlines and countries that had previously flown to Kabul to resume their flights as before,” Taliban spokesperson Abdul Qahar Baikhi said in a statement on Sunday. 

The Kabul airport suffered significant damage during the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan which concluded on August 31. Airport authorities in Kabul have said that the airport has received flights carrying humanitarian assistance from Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Pakistan. 

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The officials further said commercial flights from Pakistan, Iran and Qatar have also been landing in Afghanistan.