Science or foreign policy? Asad Umar questions UK's decision to put Pakistan on red list
Inclusion of Pakistan on UK's red list raises question over foreign policy-based decision, he said.
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – Federal Minister for Planning, Development, Reforms and Special Initiatives Asad Umar Saturday questioned the UK government’s decision of putting Pakistan on the red list in the wake of COVID-19.
Asad Umar, who also heads the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC), took to Twitter and said, “Every country has a right to take decisions to safeguard the health of their citizens.”
“However, the recent decision by UK govt to add some countries including Pakistan on the red list raises a legitimate question whether choice of countries is based on science or foreign policy.”
Every country has a right to take decisions to safeguard the health of their citizens. However, the recent decision by UK govt to add some countries including Pakistan on the red list raises a legitimate question whether choice of countries is based on science or foreign policy pic.twitter.com/BAzaW1Lc8l
— Asad Umar (@Asad_Umar) April 3, 2021
Earlier, British Member Parliament Naz Shah also opposed the decision to add Pakistan to the Britain’s red list of travel ban countries from April 9 and termed it a political decision.
Naz Shah in her letter to Dominic Raab, Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, said that why France, Germany and India having substantially higher numbers of infections per 100,000 than Pakistan not added red list of travel ban countries.
In a message on twitter, Naz Shah said why aren’t countries which have significant more cases, including the South African variant, not on the red list too? Why Pakistan and not France, which has 10 times more cases, on the red list.
