<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>The Pakistani government has repatriated 140 students from Kyrgyzstan after mobs attacked foreign citizens in the capital, Bishkek, over the weekend.&nbsp;</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A special flight bringing the first batch of Pakistani students home landed at an airport in Lahore on Saturday night, with Islamabad planning to use more such flights to bring back citizens who want to leave Bishkek after violent incidents in the Kyrgyz capital.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On Friday, hundreds of Kyrgyz men in Bishkek attacked buildings where foreign students live, including Pakistan citizens who are among thousands studying and working in the Central Asian country.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The angry mob reportedly targeted these residences after videos of a brawl earlier this month between Krygyz and Egyptian students went viral online, prompting anti-foreigner sentiment over the past week. The Kyrgyz government deployed forces on Friday to mitigate the violence.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“Our first concern is the safe return of Pakistani students,” Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“God willing, more students would be brought back via additional flights (on Sunday).”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Students who spoke to Arab News said that the Pakistan Embassy in Kyrgyzstan advised them to stay indoors after the mob attack. But when they ran out of food and water and some became fearful of potential riots, they asked authorities to evacuate them.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that the return to Pakistan of citizens who wished to do so would be “facilitated at the government’s expense.”</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Sharif is sending a two-member delegation, including Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar, to Bishkek on Sunday to meet with Kyrgyz officials and provide assistance for Pakistani students.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“The decision to send this delegation was made to ensure necessary support and facilities for Pakistani students,” a statement issued by Sharif’s office reads.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Pakistan’s foreign ministry said on Saturday it had summoned and handed a note of protest to Kyrgyzstan’s top diplomat in the country in response to the violence in Bishkek.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Five Pakistani medical students were injured in the mob attack, Pakistan’s Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Hassan Zaigham said, with one student admitted to a local hospital with a jaw injury, reports Arab News&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“No Pakistani was killed or raped in the violence,” he told Arab News over the phone, dispelling rumors circulating on social media.&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">“The situation is under control now as Bishkek authorities have dispersed all the miscreants.”&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>