Group Criticizes Apparent Ban on Iraqi Passengers : Pan Am: Six report being turned away from flights although the airline officially has no comment.

The head of a New York-based Arab-American group reacted angrily Saturday to Pan American World Airways’ apparent policy of refusing to accept Iraqi citizens as passengers.

“This action by Pan Am stimulates prejudice in this country against Arab-Americans, as if they are a separate category prone to terrorism,” said M.T. Mehdi, president of the American-Arab Relations Committee. “It is guilt by association. It intimidates (Arab-Americans) and throws a chill on the freedom of expression.”

Mehdi said his organization was contacted by six Iraqis--all of whom are legal resident aliens in the United States--who were turned away from their flights by Pan Am agents at New York’s Kennedy International Airport last week.

A Pan Am spokesman, Jeff Kriendler, would neither confirm nor deny that the airline has decided to bar Iraqi citizens.

“I have no comment. We don’t comment on security measures,” Kriendler said Saturday.

However, two Pan Am reservation agents, who declined to give their names, said the airline has instituted such a policy.

“Due to enhanced security measures, Pan Am will not carry passengers holding Iraqi passports,” one agent said, reading a memo that he was able to call up on his computer screen.

He said the instructions in the memo advised agents to offer those passengers assistance in making other travel arrangements.

Mehdi said all six Iraqis who complained to his organization were able to find other airlines that would accept them. He said they had been booked on several different Pan Am flights last week.

One of the travelers was a professor who wanted to fly Pan Am to Europe and from there to Pakistan, where he has accepted a teaching post at the University of Karachi.

A spokesman for another major U.S. airline, American, said that among the elaborate security measures it now has in effect are procedures applying to “Iraqi nationals and persons traveling on Iraqi passports.” But he would not give further details.

“This is not to say that we will automatically not carry them,” American spokesman Al Becker said. “But we have ways and means of identifying and screening such individuals with intense care.”

Becker said he has no knowledge of Iraqi passengers being denied passage on American since the war began.

Other major airlines declined to comment on whether they have begun any policies concerning Iraqi nationals.

Several airlines, including Delta, Continental and British Airways, said they are continuing to accept all passengers regardless of nationality.

“We don’t have any kind of discriminatory policy regarding anybody’s nationality,” said British Airways spokesman John Lampl.

Similarly, Continental is “not excluding Iraqi nationals from any of our flights,” said spokesman Richard Danforth. But, he added, “I wouldn’t speculate about what might occur in the future.”