Pakistani airline exits blacklist and resumes flights to Europe. But the announcement is a tragic epic fail
On January 10, 2025 Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) resumed flying between the capital Islamabad and Paris Charles De [...]

January 10, 2025 Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has resumed flights between the capital Islamabad and Paris Charles De Gaulle.
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It is about the First route reopened to a European destination since the European Union decided in late November to lift the ban on the Pakistani carrier's planes from flying in EU airspace and landing at European airports.
PIA celebrated the event on social media, posting an image that, in a very short time, turned into a tragic epic fail. The illustration shows, in fact, a Boeing 777 of the company while points straight at the Eiffel Tower. It took little for comments like "a more 'September 11' way than this was impossible to find" and "are we really promoting flight resumption like this?" to invade the network and particularly Linkedin.
All of this taking into account that Pakistan is a country that has harbored and harbors terrorists (Osama Bin Laden, when he was killed by U.S. Special Forces, was there) and that the company has a bad record when it comes to security.
The no flying to European destinations had in fact been introduced by the Union following the crash of one of the company's Airbus A320s in the May 2020 and to subsequent investigations that had revealed how dozens and dozens of PIA pilots had commercial pilot licenses expired or counterfeit.
The same company had already been on the European 'blacklist' between 2005 and 2007, although only partially: at that time the European regulator (Easa) had banned all PIA aircraft from flying over or landing on the continent, except for Boeing 777s, the only ones it considered to meet acceptable safety criteria.
PIA will also soon resume connections over Italy, where before the ban imposed on it in 2020, it served Rome Fiumicino and Milan Malpensa from Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad. A date, however, has not yet been set.
Currently the Pakistani company's fleet, much downsized from that of a decade ago, includes 32 aircraft, including 4 Boeing 777-300ERs and 8 Boeing 777-200ERs with three classes (Business, Premium Economy and Economy), 17 Airbus A320-200s and 3 ATR-42 turboprops.