Plane with Indian passengers leaves France after police release

VATRY, France: A plane with close to 300 Indian passengers detained near Paris over suspicions of human trafficking took off on Monday for Mumbai after being cleared for departure by French police, an AFP reporter said.

The Airbus A340 carrying 303 Indians had been bound for Nicaragua when it was detained last Thursday at Vatry airport, east of Paris, where it had stopped for refuelling.

It had arrived from Dubai and there was an anonymous tip-off that it was carrying potential victims of human trafficking. Of the original 303 people on the passenger list, 276 were on the plane that took off just before 3:00 pm (1400 GMT).

Among the passengers staying behind were two people questioned by French police over suspected people trafficking, but a judicial source said they had now been released after establishing that the 303 passengers had boarded the plane of their own free will.

Their suspects´ release came because “the investigating judge was able to resist media pressure in this case”, said their lawyer, Salome Cohen. The others, 25 people of whom two are minors, have sought asylum in France, the prefecture said. Their applications would be processed at Charles-de-Gaulle airport. After questioning the passengers for two days, French prosecutors on Sunday gave the go-ahead for the plane to leave.