Pakistan embassy in Muscat restores passport services after global outage

Passport services at the Pakistan Embassy in Muscat have resumed after a week-long suspension caused by a technical fault at headquarters in Islamabad, offering relief to expatriates in Oman.

Syed Naveed Safdar Bokhari, Pakistani Ambassador to Oman, said all passport-related services, including renewals and new issuances, restarted on Wednesday under a walk-in system.

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“Applicants can now visit the embassy to process their passport applications. There are no appointments. It’s a walk-in system. We issue tokens and handle more than 100 applications per day,” the ambassador said.

Services had been halted since April 29 due to a system failure that affected Pakistani missions worldwide, including several in the Gulf region.

The disruption left many overseas Pakistanis facing difficulties with travel, visa and residency requirements, with embassies in the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia also impacted.

The embassy has advised applicants to visit during official working hours as normal operations resume.