207 pilgrims return

LAHORE: A flight of a private airline on Sunday landed at the Lahore Airport carrying 207 Hujjaj from Saudi Arabia. The Hujjaj were warmly welcomed at the airport by the authorities of religious ministry. Earlier, PIA’s first post-Haj flight PK8702 with 166 pilgrims on board landed at Jinnah International Airport Karachi. The flight departed from Jeddah airport.

Sources said the post-Haj flight operation will continue for a month to bring back over 200,000 Pakistani pilgrims from Saudi Arabia. Earlier, Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony’s spokesperson had said that three airlines including Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) would participate in the flight operation in 10 cities including Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, Quetta, Multan, Faisalabad, Sukkur and Sialkot.

The flight operation would continue till September 15. The ministry had offered optimum facilities to pilgrims during their stay in Saudi Arabia. A total of 187 ministry officials, 469 medical mission, 545 Pakistan Muavineen—e-Hujjaj belonging to police and scouts and 900 local Muavineen-e-Hujjaj were deployed to facilitate the pilgrims during Haj 2019.