Thanks for going out of way to help stranded Air India passengers: Krishna to Pakistan

PHNOM PENH: India on Tuesday thanked Pakistan for going "out of their way" in providing all possible assistance to passengers of the Air India flight that made an emergency landing in the neighbouring country's southern Sindh province.

"I would like to convey my sincere appreciation and my thanks to the helpful attitude and cooperation that we received when an Air India flight had to land in Pakistan," external affairs minister S M Krishna said here.

He added, "I think the government of Pakistan went out of their way to make things easy for all those who were inside the aircraft and they provided every possible assistance including feeding the passengers who were on board the aircraft," he said.

"This certainly is something which India deeply appreciates," Krishna, who is here to attend an ASEAN meet, said.

On Monday, over 120 passengers and crew of an Air India plane from Abu Dhabi had made an emergency landing in Pakistan's Nawabshah airport after emergency lights in the cockpit showed that the hydraulics had failed.

A relief plane was then sent to Pakistan to bring back the passengers who arrived later in the evening.

Meanwhile, Krishna arrived here on Tuesday evening from Tokyo to participate in the 10th ASEAN-India Ministerial meeting, the Second East Asia Summit Foreign Ministerial meeting and the 19th ASEAN Regional Forum Ministerial meeting.