Russia continues to charge foreign airlines for use of its airspace

Helsinki EU-Russia summit fruits went unratified

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Russia is continuing to charge the EU airlines for the use of Siberian airspace.
      This practice is still going on in spite of the fact that an agreement reached to eliminate the charges was praised as the most important achievement of the EU-Russia summit in Helsinki a year ago.
      At the meeting, Russia promised that it would gradually remove the charges by the year 2014.
      This is not going to happen. Russia has not ratified the deal made in Helsinki, and the ratification process is not even being prepared.
      Furthermore, a ministerial-level aviation meeting between the EU and Russia that was to be held in Moscow in November was cancelled on a mere week’s notice.
     
"Russia tries to lump even this matter together with its membership in the World Trade Organisation", says Finnair director of international relations Sverker Skogberg. Such connections, however, were never mentioned during the Helsinki summit.
      The airspace fees levied for flying over Siberia will prove dear for the airlines operating between Europe and Asia. Of such airlines, the Finnish national carrier Finnair has become the fourth-largest, thanks to its intensified efforts on the Far East front.
     
At the Helsinki summit the freezing of the tariff of fees on the then level was also agreed, in spite of the increased numbers of flights.
      Even this understanding has not held up.
      Finnair, for one, has to pay extra fees for every additional departure, which means that the original EUR 20 million fee will reach EUR 25 million after the introduction of a Seoul connection next year.
     
Instead of the Russian government, the recipient of the airspace charges is Russia’s largest airline company, Aeroflot.
      The government merely levies the normal internationally agreed navigation fees, which cover no more than 30-40 percent of the total cost.
     
Nowhere else in the world are charges levied for the mere use of airspace, let alone collected by a rival airline.
      The EU airlines already pay in excess of EUR 300 million per year in the form of the questionable airspace charges.
      Relations are understandably rather strained between the Union and its eastern neighbour over aviation policy.
      Matters have certainly not been helped by a curious spat with Lufthansa over freight routes and technical stopovers. Russia closed off Russian airspace to all Lufthansa cargo flights.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  EU-Russia Summit agrees on Siberia overflights, but not on bigger issues (24.11.2006)

Helsingin Sanomat