New opportunities in the Caribbean will open up for Russian tourists. According to TASS, Russian carriers will be able to operate flights to Venezuela with a stopover in Cuba, increasing their degree of “air freedom”. That is, tourists will be able to travel along the route Moscow – Varadero – Porlamar on board Russian airlines.
The agency cites a relevant message from Rosaviatsia, which reads as follows: “The aviation authorities of Russia and Venezuela, in order to strengthen bilateral cooperation in the field of air traffic, have reached an agreement to grant the airlines of the two countries the right to fly with the fifth degree of air freedom. The experts explained that in practice this will allow Russian airlines to fly on the route Moscow – Varadero (Cuba) – Porlamar (Venezuela), and Venezuelan – on the route Caracas – Havana (Cuba) – Moscow. At the same time, the route of Russian carriers is primarily built at tourist airports in both countries.
The Federal Air Transport Agency also stated that the agreement on such flights will be valid until the end of the summer season 2024. In the winter of 2022-2023, flights between Russia and Venezuela were carried out by both the Russian Nordwind and the Venezuelan Conviasa.
Our reference: in general, the rights to operate flights in civil aviation are divided into only nine degrees of “air freedom”. The degrees start from the first and increase depending on the degree of expansion of transportation opportunities for airlines. The first, very initial degree allows the carrier to simply cross the airspace of a foreign state without the right to land – some Russian carriers have already encountered a problem here, and it is precisely in the Caribbean directions. Maximum, the ninth allows the airline to transport passengers within a foreign country. As for the permitted fifth degree, it allows commercial airline flights from one foreign country to another, that is, two or more landings in different countries, but with a mandatory return to their country.
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