Irish airline Ryanair has taken decision to quit its operations from George Best Belfast City Airport.

The Chief Executive of the Europe's leading budget airline, Michael O'Leary has blamed the Northern Ireland government for delays in approving the extension of runway.

The airline is expected to move out of Belfast City from 31 October.

The five routes from the operations will be withdrawn are Glasgow Prestwick, London Stansted, Liverpool, East Midlands and Bristol.

The staff of 50 employees working on the Belfast routes will be provided redeployment opportunities but will result into 1,000 other job cuts. The owners of the airport have applied for the extension of runway by 590m in the direction of Belfast Lough in November 2008. The extension, if permitted, would have allow a longer take-off distance that would have provide aircraft to carry full fuel loads and full capacity passengers between the Northern Ireland capital and continental Europe. Additional 500 jobs would also be created with the extension of runway. Leary said the extension could have resulted into "five new European routes and up to 500,000 extra passengers annually, which would sustain 500 new jobs in and around city airport."