STOCKHOLM — Police detained and were questioning the man said to be carrying explosives on board a Pakistan International Airlines Boeing 777, which was diverted to Sweden while en route to Pakistan from Canada Saturday morning.
The unscheduled landing came after a woman called Canadian police from a pay phone and said that there was a man on board who may be carrying explosives with him, a Stockholm police spokesperson told NBC News. Canadian police then contacted the pilot, who requested permission to land at Sweden's Arlanda airport, according to NBC.
Canadian police informed the pilot and the plane landed at Stockholm's Arlanda airport as it was in Swedish airspace.
"He has been detained," police spokesman Kjell Lindgren told Reuters. The man, described as a Canadian citizen of Pakistani origin, was detained while the passengers were getting off the plane during an evacuation.
The plane was on its way from Toronto to Karachi, Pakistan, when the pilot requested permission to land in Stockholm, airport spokesman Anders Bredfall told NBC.
In Pakistan, a spokesman for state-run Pakistan International Airlines told NBC the incident involved flight PK782 to Karachi.
Stockholm district police spokesman Janne Hedlund told Reuters that no explosives had been found on the man. His baggage and the plane were being searched, he added.
Calls to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Canada's public safety department were not immediately returned.
(source:msnbc.msn.com)
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