PIA - Pakistan International Airlines (PK, Islamabad International) is to ground its remaining four B747-300s following the conclusion of the Hajj charter season in late October.

Pakistani Minister of State for Cabinet Secretariat and Parliamentary Affairs, Aftab Sheikh, told parliament that following their grounding, the B747s would be put up for sale. The ch-aviation aircraft database lists the airline's B747-300 fleet as: AP-BFU (msn 23392), AP-BFV (msn 23534), AP-BFY (msn 23920) and AP-BGG (msn 24215) of which all are ex-Cathay Pacific (CX, Hong Kong International) machines.

Following that the minister said, the airline's last eight remaining A310-300s - cn 585, 590, 653, 656, 676, 678, 682 and 687 - will also be retired and put up for sale.

PIA has embarked on a major restructuring exercise involving the renewal of its ageing fleet. With the recent arrivals of B737-800 WIN.s, the carrier also intends to ground its fleet of B737-300s - AP-BCD (msn 23297), AP-BCF (msn 23299) and AP-BFT (msn 23298) - in the near future.

Among the IMF-endorsed measures are the partial privatization of the loss-making carrier.