Pakistan International Airlines apologises for '9/11-like' Eiffel Tower ad

After facing a major backlash, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) issued an apology on Friday for sharing an advert of a plane flying at France’s Eiffel Tower. The advertisement aimed at promoting PIA’s first flight to Paris after the safety bans were lifted by the European authorities. The creative shared by the airline showed a plane aiming at the French landmark with the caption “Paris, we’re coming today”.

The advertisement received major flak online with many comparing it to the devastating 9/11 attacks on New York Twin Towers in the United States. In 2001, two planes hijacked by Al-Qaeda flew into the historic skyscrapers, killing at least 3,000 people.

The terrorist group’s leader Osama bin Laden was eventually killed in Abbottabad by US special forces in 2011, while a Pakistani militant currently held in Guantanamo Bay is considered the chief mastermind of the attack.

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The apology

In the statement released on Friday, PIA emphasised the ad was blown out of propositions. “Unfortunately, this was blown out of proportion with connations and perceptions that were not intended,” PIA spokesman Abdullah Khan told AFP. “It might have triggered some negative emotion, for which we truly apologise,” he furthered.

During Tuesday’s Senate session, Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said that Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has ordered an inquiry into the advert, insisting that the ad “shows stupidity”. “It’s stupidity to show the Eiffel Tower and a plane close together, facing it. A better design would have shown the plane flying above or in a different direction,” he told the Senate.

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However, a PIA spokesperson told Dawn that the airline’s return to Europe was “extremely positive”, with flights so far operating at more than 95 per cent capacity. “PIA’s Paris campaign involved multiple mediums. We ran TV commercials, radio ads and a print ad (this one). All were received extremely positively resulting in great reach and consequently, our loads have picked up on the Paris sector,” the spokesperson told the Pakistani news outlet.

“The total collective reach of this ad alone is 30 million now with 755,000 reactions out of which only 10pc were negative. The negative was triggered by a smear campaign that was started from across the border, concocting a connotation which was and can never be intended," he added. It is pertinent to note that the debt-ridden PIA was banned from flying to the European Union in June 2020. The ban was imposed a month after one of its Airbus A-320s plunged into a Karachi street, killing nearly 100 people.

With inputs from AFP.