Staff working for Pakistan’s national airline carrier have gone on strike, severely disrupting air travel in the country and leaving thousands of travelers stranded.

Employees of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), as well as some pilots, flight crew and airport staff, have initiated the strike as a protest to the recent axing of employees allegedly because they opposed a code-sharing agreement that PIA has proposed with Turkish Airlines. The strikers are demonstrating against the agreement with the Turkish carrier and are insisting on the reinstatement of the sacked employees.

Members of the strike are also calling for the resignation of Aijaz Haroon, PIA's managing director, an airline pilot and reportedly a close ally of President Asif Ali Zardari. "The strike continues, and it will continue until Haroon goes," stated Uzair Khan, joint secretary of the Pakistan Airline Pilots' Association (PALPA).

Under the proposed agreement with Turkish Airlines, which remains subject to approval by government officials and regulators, PIA would give up some of its most profitable European and U.S. routes, including flights to Germany, Spain, Italy, France, Holland, Chicago and New York. A joint action committee of PIA employees warned that handing over these lucrative routes would deprive PIA of billions of rupees in revenue and threaten jobs at the airline. "Over the past three years, the managing director of the airline has failed to deliver and he must now go," said Sohail Baluch, the chief of PALPA, told Reuters. "We demand of the government to scrap whatever deal the PIA is planning with Turkish Airlines and dismiss the [managing director], and replace him with a professional person.”

As a result of the cancellation of dozens of flights, there have been reports of scuffles between the strikers and PIA management at airports in Karachi and elsewhere, while some pilots and crew have been prevented from getting on aircraft.

"Thousands of passengers have suffered. We are trying our best to ring up passengers of flights which are likely to suffer long delays and tell them to wait until our next call before they leave for the airport," a PIA spokesman told reporters.

Reported by Sam Doving.

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