Nepal upgrading air safety to end EU ban: official

[KATHMANDU] Nepal will install new radar and weather monitoring systems to improve safety and try to get its airlines removed from an EU blacklist, a government official said.

The Himalayan nation, which counts tourism as a major revenue-earner, has suffered a number of air crashes in recent years which have usually been blamed on inexperienced pilots, poor management and bad maintenance.

In the latest accident, just weeks after the European Commission banned Nepalese airlines from flying to the European Union, all 18 people aboard died when their plane crashed into a hillside in the country's mountainous west last February.