Nepal lifts ban on allowing migrant workers to Afghanistan

KATHMANDU: Nepal will allow its nationals to go to war-torn Afghanistan for work, a labour ministry official said on Thursday, ending an almost four-month ban imposed after 13 Nepali security guards were killed by a Taliban suicide bomber in the Afghan capital.

Labour Ministry Spokesman Govinda Mani Bhurtel said employers would have to make adequate security arrangements for their stay, travel and work before Nepali nationals were given a work permit by the government to leave Nepal.

"We´ll allow our people to go to Afghanistan to work only with foreign missions and international companies located inside the Green Zone which is considered safe," Bhurtel told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

"Their security and safety must be ensured by the employers," he said, adding the organisations included United Nations agencies and embassies of the US, Britain and Canada.

Nepalis are still banned from working in other conflict hotspots such as Iraq, Libya and Syria, Bhurtel said.