Russia threatens to close air space to rogue EU airlines

Moscow - Russia is threatening to close its air space to EU airlines which continue to breach safety regulations, Russian news agencies reported on Friday, quoting the federal air navigation regulator.

The regulator did not name the companies alleged to have breached the rules, saying it did not want to "compromise their reputation". It said that the breaches arose from a "lack of discipline" and poor training of pilots.

The agency had written to the European civil aviation conference asking the European Union to take "urgent measures" to improve control of flights through Russian air space.

The complaint was based on a study of flights in the Moscow area between June 2006 and February 2007 which showed that the airlines had breached air traffic procedures on 18 occasions and on five occasions had flown over "forbidden zones."

The letter was from the head of the Russian federal air navigation agency Alexander Neradko to the president of European civil aviation conference Michel Wachenheim.

It said that if European air authorities "do not take adequate measures immediately to deal with this situation", the Russian agency would be "obliged to refuse to grant flight clearance for flights over Russia by airlines" which had breached the rules.

European Commission transport spokesman Michele Cercone said that the EU's executive arm had received no official report or letter on the matter from the Russian side and so could not comment.

"All I've seen so far have been reports in the press indicating that the Russian authorities appear to be concerned about a number of cases of European airlines flying their aircraft either too high or too low," he told a press conference in Brussels.

None of the associations representing EU airlines had been contacted "so it is difficult for me to comment on something which officially we have no notice of," he added.

Agence France Presse