FAS is aiming at increasing the list of nominated air carriers.

Federal Anti-Monopoly Service of Russian Federation is aiming at increasing the list of Russian nominated air carriers, announced the head officer of FAS Igor Artemiev.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin authorized FAS to discuss with anti-monopoly authorities of CIS countries the possibility to enlarge the list of nominated air carriers in order to strengthen business competition. Majority of the airlines in CIS are monopolists that are not interested in sharing flights and giving part of the market to the Russian airlines, thus the discussion of the process is slowed down. Vice Prime Minister Sergey Ivanov gave the task of increasing the list of nominated air carriers for all destinations and not only CIS countries.

Igor Artemiev said that the most difficult situation developed with flights to France, where there are two nominated carriers, Aeroflot and Air France. Very positive example is the situation with the flights to Germany and USA, where there are no nominated carriers. “I don’t understand why we cannot allow two more airlines to operate flights to France”, contemplates Mr. Artemiev.

FAS insists that Ministry of Transport enlarges the list of nominated carriers and submits a report on what routes and with which airlines the situation is being discussed. «We receive the run-around replies. Either our monopolists control the moderators that are not actively trying to reach the targets that were set by Mr. Putin, or some other governments are not interested in such cooperation due to some internal reasons”, concluded the head office of FAS.