Pakistani airline blacklists passengers for smoking, misbehaving with crew

Islamabad: The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) on Thursday blacklisted an unspecified number of passengers for violating a no-smoking rule and misbehaving with the crew during its Islamabad-Birmingham flight earlier this week.

PIA acting CEO Nayyar Hayat directed airline authorities to ban the concerned passengers for their "unruly" behaviour on PK-791 with immediate effect, Dawn online reported.

"The concerned passengers were not only smoking during the flight but also misbehaved with cabin crew," an airline statement said.

The flag carrier`s action comes a day after UK police arrested a British man of Pakistani origin for allegedly verbally abusing an air hostess and smoking during the same flight.

The flight attendant had reportedly confronted two to three men for smoking in the lavatory, a serious violation of global flight rules. 

In response, the men had misbehaved with her and one man in particular hurled verbal abuse at her, reports Dawn online.

The air hostess complained about the incident to the pilot, who upon landing in Birmingham alerted the police.

British police personnel then made a number of passengers connected to the incident disembark and later arrested one man from the group.