Afghanistan's Mazar-i-Sharif airport resumes work

Kabul [Afghanistan], March 29 : The airport in Mazar-i-Sharif has partly resumed operations and is expected to be fully restored by August with the assistance of specialists from Uzbekistan, said a representative of the Uzbekistan Ministry of Transport, Sputnik reported.
Special Representative of the President of Uzbekistan for Afghanistan Ismatullah Irgashev met the Taliban in the northern Afghan province of Balkh in October 2021 and pledged that Uzbekistan would help to restore the Mazar-i-Sharif airport.
Subsequently, Uzbekistan sent a team of technicians to help repair the airport's equipment.
"A team of our specialists is assisting to help restore the Mazar-i-Sharif airport. Basically, the airport is accepting aircraft," the representative of the Ministry of Transport said, according to Sputnik.
The official said that the Uzbek side has trained 20 Afghan specialists in air traffic control at the airport while work on replacing the air navigation equipment is currently underway.
"It in progress, I think that by August 1 (the airport) will be fully operational," the representative further stated.
The Taliban took over Afghanistan after entering Kabul in August 2021, leading to the collapse of the Ashraf Ghani led government and mass evacuations.
Later in September, the outfit announced the composition of the new interim government of Afghanistan.
The country is currently battered by the deepening economic, humanitarian, and security crisis following the Taliban takeover.