PIA resumes Beijing-Islamabad flights

BEIJING:

The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) resumed its passenger flights on Beijing-Islamabad route after a gap of nearly seven months when PK-855 took off from the Chinese capital for Islamabad on Sunday.

The national-flag carrier resumed its commercial passenger flights on Islamabad-Xian and Beijing-Islamabad section from last month but the aircraft had to return back to Islamabad from Xian as the Beijing Capital Airport was closed for the international flights for Covid-19 prevention, official sources told APP here.

The PK-854 arrived in Xian from Islamabad on Saturday. The PIA flight landed in Beijing from Xian after no-Covid 19 case was found. Then flight PK-855 returned to Islamabad from Beijing on Sunday.

It may be mentioned here that the PIA operated its last flight between Beijing-Islamabad on December 19, 2021.PIA is also operating direct weekly passenger flights between Islamabad and Chengdu, capital city of China’s Sichuan province on every Wednesday.

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Chengdu is PIA’s new destination in China in addition to Xian and Beijing. In March, PIA was allowed to operate flights for Chinese cities of Xian and Guangzhou from Pakistan.

The Beijing-Islamabad flight will facilitate passengers, especially living in the Chinese capital, including officials, traders and students. The flight will also facilitate Chinese personnel working on different projects being completed under China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in Pakistan.

The Pakistani passengers who left for Islamabad from Beijing Capital Airport said that PIA was expanding its flights network for China providing Pakistani and Chinese travellers to have more options to directly reach in different cities between China and Pakistan.