ISLAMABAD: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) operations to Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, have been completely suspended, the Pakistan Airports Authority (PAA) said, as reported by ARY News.
A Fly Jinnah flight operating on the Lahore–Karachi–Riyadh route (LHR–KHI–RUH) was cancelled, while Flynas cancelled its Karachi–Madinah and Karachi–Riyadh flights due to technical reasons.
However, flights to Madinah and Jeddah operated by various other airlines from Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, and Islamabad continue to operate as scheduled.
The Pakistan Airports Authority stated that special facilitation counters have been established at all major airports across the country to assist affected passengers.
It is pertinent to mention here that at least 12 people were killed and more than 300 wounded in Houthi attack on Riyadh’s international airport on Saturday, Saudi Arabia’s General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) announced
This is the deadliest attack in the kingdom in more than a decade.
The dead from the third attack this week on the airport included four Saudis, two people from Bangladesh and one person each from the US, Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Sudan and Egypt, the Saudi civil aviation authority said. At the latest count, 309 were wounded, officials said.
President Donald Trump said Washington was considering joining Saudi strikes on the Houthis in the conflict, a spillover from the war on Iran that the US and Israel launched in February.
Hospitals were flooded with wounded brought by ambulance and helicopter, some in critical condition after the attack, which occurred without warning.
CONFLICT ESCALATES AFTER YEMEN WAR CEASEFIRE UNRAVELS
The two previous attacks on King Khalid International Airport this week killed four and caused heavy damage to a Saudi commercial plane parked on the tarmac.
The strikes have exposed vulnerabilities in Saudi defence capabilities as it wages an air campaign against the Houthis to support a ground war by the Yemeni government against the Iran-backed group.
The Houthis have not claimed responsibility for the attack, but a Saudi-led military coalition vowed to respond.
Read more: Major Saudi conferences to proceed, organisers say, despite deadly airport attack
Trump, asked whether the US planned to join Saudi strikes on the Houthis, told reporters: “We may. We’re going to look at it. We just found out about the recent attack, so we’ll make a decision. We move very quickly.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned the attacks on the airport, saying they “demonstrate a blatant disregard for innocent civilian life”. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also condemned Saturday’s strike, reiterating that attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure violate international law and must cease immediately.
Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni government have claimed hundreds of strikes on targets in Houthi-held territory. The Houthis have said these killed civilians including women and children. Reuters could not independently verify those claims.
The Saudis entered the Yemen war in 2015 at the head of an Arab coalition to try to force the Houthis out of the Yemeni capital Sanaa. The war became a bloody stalemate, with hundreds of thousands of Yemenis killed by fighting and famine.
A 2022 ceasefire reached by the Saudis and the Houthis unravelled this summer, culminating in a lightning Houthi advance that took the Red Sea chokepoint of Bab el-Mandeb from Saudi-backed government forces.
