Fear of confiscation
Aeroflot suspends all international flights
3/5/2022 3:44 p.m
The world is getting smaller for people in Russia. Many countries have closed their airspace to Russian planes. Now Russia’s largest airline is also stopping connections to all other countries.
The Russian airline Aeroflot is suspending all international flights because of the drastic Western sanctions. The company announced that flights abroad would be stopped in the evening. Flights to Russia should therefore no longer be available from Tuesday. Domestic flights and connections with Belarus are not affected.
Aeroflot justified the step with “circumstances that affect flight operations”. For its part, Russia’s aviation regulator said it had “recommended” Russian airlines operating chartered aircraft abroad to avoid international flights. This is intended to prevent confiscation of the machines due to western sanctions. The recommendation is the “consequence of the very high risk of a take-off ban or confiscation of aircraft from Russian companies abroad”.
The second largest Russian airline S7 announced on Friday that it would no longer fly abroad.
Russia is currently being hit hard by Western sanctions imposed over the attack on Ukraine. Dozens of countries blocked their airspace for Russian machines and stopped the supply of spare parts, especially for Boeing and Airbus machines. Some of the Russian airlines are also threatened with the confiscation of their aircraft abroad, since three quarters of the machines do not belong to the companies but to foreign leasing companies.