Six months after its inauguration, the Pokhara International Airport saw its first international flight land on Wednesday. The A-319 Sichuan Airlines aircraft, with 130 passengers on board, arrived in the morning from Tianfu International Airport in China’s Sichuan province. It marked the beginning of regular operations, raising hopes that the international airport, the second in Nepal after the one in Kathmandu, will be economically viable. While the government of Nepal has not yet made any formal statement, Chinese Ambassador Chhen Song, who welcomed the inaugural flight in the presence of Nepal’s minister for Tourism & Culture Sundan Kirati, said it is a successful project under China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Nepal. The $244 -million project, that took almost six years for completion, was built on a soft loan from China’s Exim Bank. It was inaugurated on January 1 this year, but was lying idle as the Nepal government had been unable to manage flight operations between Nepal and other countries.
