India has granted approval for Japan to pick up humanitarian aid stored in Mumbai and reserved for Ukrainian refugees in Europe, the nation’s foreign ministry said late on Thursday, adding that a commercial rather than a military plane should be doing this.
The approval comes after Japan accused India of preventing its Self-Defense Forces plane from landing in its territory earlier Thursday. The aircraft was expected to take part in an aid-delivery mission backed by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
“We had received a request from Japan for permission to land in Mumbai to pick up humanitarian supplies from UNHCR depot for Ukraine and its neighboring countries. We have conveyed our approval for picking of such supplies from India using commercial aircraft,” the Indian ministry’s spokesman, Arindam Bagchi, has said.