AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) -- Two Dutch lawmakers demanded Monday that the government provide details about why a KLM Royal Dutch Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Mexico City was blocked mid-flight by U.S. authorities for having two undesirable people on board.
The flight was approaching the U.S. border from Canada on Friday when the pilots were told they could not enter American airspace because two of their 278 passengers were considered a risk, apparently due to terrorism fears, KLM spokesman Bart Koster said.
The names of those two passengers were not released.
The flight turned around and went back to Amsterdam. A new flight traveled as normal Saturday without the two passengers in question, Koster said.
It was not known what happened to the two travelers who were barred.
''They weren't suspected by the Dutch authorities or on European no-fly lists,'' he said. ''I guess they went their way.''
Koster said the incident was unusual, since U.S. and European no-fly lists usually are the same.
Dutch Justice Ministry spokesman Wim Kok said he could not comment on the identities of the two passengers or whether they were suspected of having links to terrorism.
''Of course we know who they are. But there was no reason to arrest them,'' he said. ''There was also no request to arrest them from the U.S. side.''
Two lawmakers demanded that Justice Minister Piet Hein Donner answer questions about the incident.
''Was there no other option than to make this plane turn around above Canada?'' lawmakers Peter van Heemst and Co Verdas wrote.
''What was it these people were suspected of by the United States that they couldn't pass through its airspace ... and why isn't that information known in Holland?''
Ministers must at least respond to such questions by parliament within three weeks, but they seldom reveal much.
