In the news today, German airline Lufthansa cargo seems to be on the receiving end of some Russian strong-arm tactics. Lufthansa currently operates it’s Asia cargo hub at Astana, Kazakhstan but Russia wants Lufthansa to move the hub into Siberia so Russia has removed Lufthansa’s permission to fly through their airspace. Presumably this permission will be withheld until Lufthansa complies.
The Russian Transport Ministry retorts that Lufthansa are not banned, rather their temporary permission to operate in Russian airspace has expired.
Lufthansa don’t particularly want to move to Siberia, they cite the famously poor Siberian weather and lack of ground transport infrastructure at the mentioned sites of Novosibirsk or Krasnojarsk as sufficient reason for sticking with Kazakhstan. It is worth remembering that these days, while Kazakhstan is a sovereign nation, Siberia remains part of Russia (and would therefore be a boost to tax and trade if Lufthansa operated there)
Image credit: Juergen Lehle
Tags: khazakhstan, lufthansa cargo, russia, siberia
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