What happened
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) resumed direct flights between Lahore and Manchester on Thursday 2 July 2026, ending a six-year gap on the route. Flight PK-709 departed Lahore with 325 passengers on board, and an inaugural ceremony was held at Lahore airport where PIA Chief Operating Officer Khurram Mushtaq saw off travellers.
The first service in the other direction left Manchester for Lahore on Wednesday night. PIA said it now operates five weekly flights between Pakistan and Manchester — four from Islamabad and one from Lahore — and that the resumption would strengthen people-to-people ties between the two countries.
Why the route was suspended
Pakistani carriers were barred from flying to the European Union, the United Kingdom and the United States in June 2020 after a PIA aircraft crashed in Karachi, killing nearly 100 people on board. The European Union Air Safety Agency had already restricted PIA over safety concerns, and the ban widened after the then aviation minister, Ghulam Sarwar Khan, told parliament that pilots’ licences were “dubious”.
The European agency lifted its ban in November 2024, and in July 2025 the UK removed Pakistan from its Air Safety List, allowing Pakistani airlines to apply to operate flights to Britain. PIA received approval to resume UK flights in September 2025 and restarted operations with Manchester as its first destination, before announcing on 8 January that it would also resume direct flights to London.
Why it matters
The Lahore-Manchester link restores a direct connection between Punjab and one of Britain’s largest Pakistani diaspora communities and adds capacity on a route that had previously required a change of aircraft. It is also a commercial milestone for PIA as the airline rebuilds its international network following the lifting of restrictions. The airline’s privatisation reached a first financial closing on 29 June, when an Arif Habib-led consortium took control, a development KhabarWire covered in its report on the first closing.
Sources & reporting notes
This is a summary of published reporting, not independent reporting. Details are as carried by the cited source, which was reviewed on 2026-07-02.
- Dawn — "PIA's direct flight from Lahore to Manchester takes off after 6 years"2 July 2026 · The first PK-709 departure with 325 passengers, the Manchester-Lahore service, the five weekly flights and the history of the UK/EU ban.
