The flag carrier airline of Pakistan hopes to relaunch flights to the UK after a four-year ban on operations in Europe.
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) announced plans to resume journeys to Europe on Friday after the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) lifted its ban on the airline.
Following the deadly crash of PIA flight 8303 that killed 97 people in May 2020, the EU aviation regulator and UK authorities suspended permission for the airline to operate in the region.
The bodies were concerned that Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority (PCAA) had failed to comply with international aviation safety standards and that pilots’ licenses were invalid.
PIA has previously urged EASA to lift the ban that prevented the fleet of 34 planes from flying to and from the continent.
The EASA cited “restored confidence” in the PCAA after a lengthy assessment of the aviation authority on 29 November.
Regulators in the UK have not yet granted permission for PIA to land in London, Manchester and Birmingham as they plan to.
However, the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) told Aviation Week in a statement that it hopes to remove Pakistani airlines from the UK Air Safety List “in the near future”.
“While we therefore support the restoration of such connections as soon as practicable, the circumstances that led to the suspension of those services require a rigorous safety case to be demonstrated first,” the CAA said.
Before the crash, PIA offered seven nonstop routes between Pakistan and the UK, including to London Heathrow Airport from Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore and Sialkot.
PIA CEO Amir Hayat, speaking in Urdu in a video posted on X/Twitter: “Today is a very important day for us in which we have made a very important commitment.
“We have at this time achieved success on PIA flights from Europe. At present, I am grateful to the Ministry of Aviation and all those agencies who supported our work and supported us, especially the PIA team whose hard work and commitment has been with us for 4.5 years.”
The government aim to sell a 60 per cent stake in the carrier after the ban cost the airline 40 billion rupees (£372m) annually in revenue.
PIA spokesman Abdullah Hafeez Khan told Reuters: “PIA plans to approach the UK’s Department for Transport (DfT) for UK route resumption, as EASA clearance is a prerequisite for their decision.”
Mr Kahn added that the airline intends to resume flights to Europe, starting with Paris, within the next three to four weeks following EASA’s approval.
“With Europe now and upcoming UK routes, we anticipate increased revenue potential and hence a rise in PIA’s value during the privatisation process,” he added.
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