COLOMBO, Nov 17: Pilots of an international airline Monday refused to fly 102 Pakistani men who were being deported from Sri Lanka after overstaying their visas, officials said.

The men were to be flown home on a commercial flight out of Sri Lanka’s only international airport, officials said, without naming the airline

“They wanted the men to be handcuffed and each to be escorted by two guards,” a prison official said. “We can do the handcuffs, but we can’t afford to send so many guards on a mission like this.”

The Pakistan nationals were taken back to jail pending new arrangements to send them home. They were among 254 Pakistani men sentenced to one year in jail in August for trying to leave the island illegally and travel to Europe. They were being deported before serving their full sentences.

Police said the Pakistanis had flown to Sri Lanka from Karachi legitimately and then driven to the island’s south to board a ship which had been anchored about seven miles away from the coast.

Sri Lankan fishermen were known to operate modified fishing trawlers to make the hazardous three-week journey to the Red Sea from where would-be illegal immigrants were transferred to larger vessels to get to European shores.—AFP