Indian American detained at Islamabad airport over ‘hoax’ bomb alarm

Islamabad: An Indian-American man was offloaded from a Qatar Airways flight at Islamabad airport in Pakistan on Friday after he allegedly raised a "false alarm" claiming that there was a bomb on the aircraft.

Ajit Vijay Joshi, travelling to Washington via Doha, was offloaded at the Benazir International Airport around 3 am in the morning after Qatar Airways refused to board him on its plane for raising a bomb threat which turned out to be a hoax, The Express Tribune reported.

Joshi was reportedly kept under detention by the airport security in Islamabad and was only released after the flight landed safely in Doha, the newspaper reported.

Security has been tightened around the world on various airports in the wake of deadly terror attacks in Paris on November 13 and downing of a Russian plane on October 31, killing 224 people.

On November 19, a passenger plane flying from Poland to Egypt has made an emergency landing in Bulgaria, after it was reported that a bomb was placed on board the aircraft.

"A 64-year-old passenger reported about the bomb and is already being questioned by law enforcers," Xinhua news agency quoted Bulgaria's Nova TV as saying.

The passengers were evacuated from the plane flying from Warsaw to the Egyptian resort city of Hurghada.

On November 18, a woman on a Boston-bound British Airways flight, who tried to open an exit door mid-flight, was taken into custody after the plane landed in Boston, police said.

Investigations had determined that the 30-year-old woman was intoxicated, Efe news agency quoted Massachusetts State Police as saying.

No known nexus to terrorism, however, was found, police said.

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