ISLAMABAD: Pakistani national airline’s first flight to Paris in over four years landed in the French capital this week, state-run media reported on Sunday, marking the resumption of its operations to Europe. 

The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flight departed for Paris from Islamabad on Friday. The airline said on Friday that it was resuming two direct weekly flights to Paris. 

The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) suspended PIA’s authorization to operate in the EU in June 2020 over concerns about the ability of Pakistani aviation authorities to ensure compliance with international standards.

EASA, United Kingdom and United States authorities suspended permission for PIA to operate in the region after Pakistan began investigating the validity of pilots’ licenses following a deadly plane crash that killed 97 people. In November 2024, the EASA announced it had lifted the ban. 

“Pakistan International Airlines’ first flight to France has landed at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris after a gap of more than four years,” Radio Pakistan reported. 

The report said that PIA passengers and crew were warmly received in Paris on Friday by Pakistan Charge d’Affairs Huzefa Khanum along with the Pakistani diaspora.

“The passengers who reached Paris via direct flight from Islamabad expressed pleasure over reduced travel time and quality service experienced by them,” it said. 

PIA, however, remains barred from operating flights to the UK and the United States. The airline flies to multiple cities inside Pakistan, including the mountainous north, as well as to the Gulf and Southeast Asia.

PIA, which employs 7,000 people, has long been accused of being bloated and poorly run — hobbled by unpaid bills, a poor safety record and regulatory issues.

Pakistan’s government has said it is committed to privatizing the debt-ridden airline and has been scrambling to find a buyer. Late last year, a deal fell through after a potential buyer reportedly offered a fraction of the asking price.

The government hopes the opening of European routes, which officials expect will be followed by a similar announcement by the UK later this year, will boost its selling potential.

PIA posted losses of $270 million in 2023, according to local media. Its liabilities were nearly $3 billion, about five times the total worth of its assets.

In the same year, amid a national economic crisis, dozens of domestic flights were canceled when it could not afford fuel for its planes.

PIA came into being in 1955 when the government nationalized a loss-making commercial airline, and enjoyed rapid growth until the 1990s.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif this week rejected “concocted” allegations by Afghanistan’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai, who accused Islamabad of arming and training Daesh militants. 

In a statement this week, Stanikzai claimed Daesh has centers in Pakistan where Pakistan Army soldiers arm and train militants, and then send them to Afghanistan for subversive activities. 

His allegations come amid tense relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan, with both countries trading blame over surging militant attacks in their countries. 

“Pakistan categorically rejects baseless, concocted, and contrived allegations by Acting Afghanistan DFM Stanikzai, which are an attempt to shift the blame,” Asif wrote on social media platform X on Friday.

The Pakistani defense minister said that as per the UN Monitoring Team’s report, over two dozen militant groups such as the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, Al-Qaeda, Daesh, East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) and Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) are operating in Afghanistan.

“The interim Afghan authorities are well advised to fulfill the assurances given to the international community by dismantling terrorist infrastructure and taking visible and verifiable actions to prevent Afghan soil from being used against other countries,” Asif added. 

Ties between the two neighbors have been strained because of a surge in militant attacks in Pakistan’s western regions that border Afghanistan since 2022, after the breakdown of a fragile truce between the Pakistani government and the outlawed TTP.

Pakistan has frequently accused neighboring Afghanistan of sheltering and supporting militant groups that launch cross-border attacks. Afghan officials deny involvement, insisting Pakistan’s security issues are an internal matter of Islamabad.

The two countries also conducted cross-border strikes in each other’s territory last month in the latest escalation of hostilities along the border.