Pakistan reverses Taiwanese airlines ban

‘ONE CHINA’ DECISION: A Cabinet spokesperson said that Pakistan had pandered to Beijing, and disregarded international rules and reality with the overflight ban

The first Taiwanese commercial aircraft since restrictions were lifted flew over Pakistan yesterday morning following an abrupt U-turn by authorities to approve permits that were briefly revoked due to Islamabad’s “one China” policy.

EVA Airways (長榮航空) Flight 65 from Taipei to Vienna entered Pakistani airspace at about 3:30am local time, Flightradar24 tracking data showed.

All other Europe-bound EVA Air and China Airlines (華航) flights that departed late on Wednesday night into early yesterday morning opted to use Russian airspace, or go via India.

Pakistani flags are pictured at a market in Karachi, Pakistan, on Aug. 11.

Photo: EPA

The airlines had been forced to detour, including flying over Russia, since Sunday, after Pakistan shut its airspace to Taiwanese carriers, citing support of Beijing’s “one China” policy.

However, just hours after Bloomberg News reported the move, Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority hastily renewed the permits for the Taiwanese carriers.

They would now be allowed to fly through Pakistani airspace until March 27 next year, documents dated on Wednesday showed.

EVA Air declined to comment, while China Airlines did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

No country had previously said it would deny all Taiwanese carriers use of airspace.

Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) yesterday said that the Cabinet “deeply regretted” Pakistan’s brief closure of its airspace to Taiwanese airlines.

“We deeply regret Pakistan’s behavior, including pandering to China by compromising flight safety, disregarding international rules and reality, undermining our national sovereignty, and politicizing and weaponizing airspace,” Lee said when asked about the issue at a Cabinet news conference.

“The Republic of China, Taiwan, is a sovereign country. It and China are not subordinate to each other. This is an undeniable, objective fact and the status quo in the Taiwan Strait,” she said.

A Ministry of Transportation and Communications official said that the access period coincided with the International Air Transport Association’s winter schedule, and that an application for continued access would be filed for the summer schedule that follows.

The ministry would remain in close contact with the airlines about any changes in airspace access, the official said.

“We suspect China [was] behind this,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Chen Ming-chi (陳明祺) told Bloomberg Television.

“China Airlines and EVA received a notice from the Pakistan authorities that they will lift the ban, but only temporarily ... until the end of the winter,” Chen said.

“We condemn Pakistan, and if China is behind this, I think that is a very bad practice to use its leverage over the countries in the global south to do that,” he said. “I think that gets in the way of the safety of the passengers and the smooth operation of the global supply chain.”

Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun (郭嘉昆) told reporters that “as far as we are aware, there are no obstacles for residents of the Taiwan region to travel internationally.”

In April, the Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar revoked overflight permits for President William Lai’s (賴清德) flight to Eswatini, forcing him to postpone the trip.

At the time, Taiwan blamed “intense pressure” from China for the revocation.

“China now learned that this could be an effective way to block our airspace access and therefore sort of further isolate Taiwan,” Chen said. “We see this is the discovery that they can weaponize the airspace assets.”

Many like-minded countries had assisted Taiwan over the airspace closure, he said.

“We are afraid that this might be a practice that spreads to other global south countries,” he said. “I think that is a major concern for not only for Taiwan, but also for other countries in the region and beyond.”

Additional reporting by CNA