Pakistan Airlines runs out of fuel due to non-payments, cancels dozens of flights
State-owned Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has been forced to cancel dozens of flights due to a critical lack of fuel as suppliers refuse to supply it because of non-payments, amid renewed government attempts to privatize it.
“Yesterday, 77 flights, both domestic and international, were canceled due to the current fuel crisis,” Abdullah Hafeez, a spokesman for the Pakistani airline, told EFE on Monday.
Today alone, PIA canceled 19 flights. The latest crisis of the Pakistani state-owned airline, once a national pride that for years has become a bottomless pit of debt and ongoing scandals, began two weeks ago.
“No one gives us fuel unless we pay in advance, so operations have been affected,” Hafeez explained.
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The fuel crisis comes on top of economic problems that forced PIA to ground more than a third of its 31-aircraft fleet in September, with three of them irreparably damaged.
According to government data, the cumulative losses of the airline, which flies to 25 international and 24 domestic destinations, will exceed 800 billion Pakistani rupees ($2.7 billion) by the end of 2023.
Last August, the government of former Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced renewed plans to privatize the national airline.
PIA has been marked by successive scandals in recent years. The European Union and the United Kingdom suspended the airline’s authorization to operate in their territory from 2020, after it became known that a third of Pakistani pilots had false licenses.
With information from EFE
Plataforma Informativa de Aviación Comercial líder en América Latina.