Turkish Airlines’ lower cost unit AnadoluJet has discontinued sales for its planned new Antalya - Belgrade flights, which were to launch this July, after the Serbian Civil Aviation Directorate failed to issue the carrier with a permit to maintain the service. Operations were to be carried out four times per week with the Boeing 737-800 aircraft. Air Serbia announced last week it plans to run charter flights to Antalya this summer. The route was among the busiest in July and August last year when there were several flights per day to the Turkish coastal city. Furthermore, the carrier will also run charters between Niš and Antalya from June 19, with flights to operate every ten days.
Services between Serbia and Turkey are regulated by a rigid bilateral air service agreement which came into force in 2019 after it took four years for it to be approved by Turkish parliament. The deal designates Air Serbia as Serbia’s operating carrier, while Turkey has nominated Turkish Airlines and Pegasus Airlines. The three carriers are able to maintain services between the two countries with limitations in the number of operated flights and capacity. The agreement does not regulate charter operations between the two countries, which has been a contentious issue on several occasions. Acting in line with the agreement, the Serbian Civil Aviation Directorate has the right to turn down AnadoluJet’s flight request. Under the deal, each airline must take into consideration how their operations will affect their competitors, while regulators are able to determine if any increase in capacity or frequencies is justified and in line with market conditions.
The Directorate previously blocked Turkish Airlines from deploying its wide-body Airbus A330-200 aircraft on flights from Istanbul to Belgrade and later refused to allow the Turkish carrier to increase frequencies from fourteen to eighteen weekly. AnadoluJet is significantly expanding its international operations this summer with dozens of new routes to be launched. Within the region, it has already commenced services from Istanbul’s Sabiha Gokcen Airport to Sarajevo and also plans to introduce flights from Antalya and Bodrum to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s capital, as well as from Istanbul and Bodrum to Pristina and from Antalya to Skopje.
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ReplyDeleteWhy is it so difficult to reach an agreement with Turkey, preferably one without limitations?
ReplyDeleteBecause it would not be beneficial for Air Serbia
Deletebut would be great for serbians as consumers...
DeleteNot in he long run if all the money they spent on a holiday, both aircraft tickets and hotel go to Turkey and nothing stays here.
DeleteWhy everyone simply presume this is on demand of Serbia and that goal is to protect AirSerbia?!
DeleteHave you maybe thought that it's Turkey protecting Turkish Airlines and refused to have open sky with Serbia so now it's hitting them back?
Somehow I don't think Turkish Airlines needs to be protected from Air Serbia.
DeleteNot protecting from AirSerbia, but simply preserving their domination (like GOS does with AirSerbia after all). For Turkey TA is a company of national interes and they invest huge amounts in making them airline with the wildest NW in the world.
DeleteWhen Agreement was made in 2014-2015 they haven't foreseen demand growth between Serbia and Turkey, but I wander why they don't initiate a change nowdays.
Why am I not surprised
ReplyDeleteNot the first time they've done this. Remember when they blocked Ryanair from starting Hahn-Nis?
ReplyDeleteIt was totally different story
DeleteRegardless. They've blocked Turkish Airlines many times like it says in the article.
DeleteTurkish had notning to do with INI-HHN. It was Ryanair at that time.
DeleteTurkish was blocked as CAD has a right to block them and protect JU. Now when JU has code share witk TK I do not think they will be blocked anymore but of course it does not include charter traffic.
JU wants to keep there their monopoly.
They've blocked Al Masria from Egypt from flying to BEG in 2019. It came down to a tour operator choosing them over Air Serbia. Big no no.
DeleteGood that the Government decided to protect JU.
ReplyDeleteThe Turks are price dumping to gain share at our expense!
btw this is illegal in EU ...
DeleteIt's illegal because Turkey and EU have free skies agreement. Not the case between Serbia and Turkey. In their case it isn't illegal.
DeleteAnonymous 09:16
DeleteExactly!
blocking competition is illegal ...
Delete^ Not the case under Serbia-Turkey bilateral. Read the article.
DeleteWelcome to the 1960s where the national carrier is praised and protectionism is at its highest level.
DeleteAnonymous10:28 - yup, this agreement is against EU laws u are totally correct!
DeleteNeither country is in the EU.
Delete@ 9,15
DeleteSerbia and Turkey are not EU members.
@ 10,25
As long as there is no agreement in place allowing the carrier to operate, than its not. Canada and Germany are examples of countries that limit airlines operating to their respective countries.
I doubt Turkey would object to Air Serbia starting 4 weekly to Antalya
ReplyDeleteSome years ago they denied slots for JU at IST.
DeleteNot true. IST awarded nighttime slots to JU while they wanted daytime ones. Seems like Turks knew better as with the slots JU asked for most western European connections could not be made at the time.
DeleteAnon 09:13
DeleteNot true at all. There were no room at old Atatürk Airport (IST) at all.
Now they are promoting IST airport to all foreign carriers.
@ 09,19 and 09,35
DeleteTurkey revoked JU it's slots at IST that Jat Airways was using at the time, giving them slots after midnight, because of the rebranding into Air Serbia. TK at that time was operating on some days a 3rd daily flight and Pegasus 4 pw, which was not allowed under the agreement but tolerated by Serbia up until that point.
JU for almost a year was operating to SAW before Serbia demanded the slots back, threatening to revoke landing rights to Turkish carriers. Days before this was to be implemented, Turkey returned JU its slots and TK was forced to remove the 3rd daily rotations, again Serbia tollerated more frequncies to Turkish carriers than that allowed under the agreement.
CAD is using it's position to fend off competition for another state interest company.
ReplyDeleteBe sure that Air Serbia asked them to. They didn't make that decision on their own.
DeleteOf course. CAD does what JU requests from them, whenever that's possible.
DeleteAt a time when they should be happy with any new airline they can get...
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteAYT is a cash machine for Air Serbia
ReplyDeleteI can imagine. I remember some days last year they had 5 flights per day.
DeleteIt's clear why they blocked them.
DeleteI thought this would be sorted with the codeshare between JU and TK.
ReplyDeleteCode share is for regular traffic, not for charters
DeleteWasn't this regular traffic too. It was supposed to operate four times per week and tickets were on sale for all passengers.
DeleteIt's a shame because it would have increased passenger numbers.
ReplyDeleteIf it wasn't for the free skies agreement they would probably block Aegean from Rhodes and Heraklion too.
ReplyDeleteWizz Air to Greece too.
Delete*open skies
DeleteOr W6 to Malta
DeleteIf it wasn't for open skies Wizz would never have a base in BEG :D
DeleteSerbia also had Centavia that was denied landing rights in neighbouring countries.
DeleteJust open the market. People and the economy will benefit much more.
ReplyDeleteThis is why we need a free market economy.
ReplyDeleteThey have the right to do it. Whether we like it or not is a different story.
ReplyDeleteJust because they can do something doesn't mean they should.
DeleteWhat a dumb decision.
ReplyDeleteLooks like BEG will never have Turkish 789, 777 or A330 as same distance cities like Athens, Kiev etc.. have.
ReplyDeleteCAD will block everything to protect Air Serbia.
I believe things have changed now that Air Serbia and Turkish Airlines are codeshare partners.
DeleteI don't think there's real change.
DeleteYU can't keep up with the capacity TK can bring to the market.
YU needs more widebodys or else if the demand keeps picking up will have a flight for Turkey every half hour.
Whose interest are they working for? The passengers or certain airlines?
ReplyDeleteThey are doing that because air serbias flights will not be used from Belgrade
DeleteBut that should not be their primary worry!
DeleteWell if the owner of Air Serbia and the Agency are the same, then it should be your concern!
DeleteFirst they try to add capacity, then they try to add frequencies, now they try to add another destination... what else can they do. Stupid directorate.
ReplyDeleteYou got to give them credit for trying time and again.
DeleteThank god the open sky has been signed and Serbia has started EU accession talks. Otherwise the directorate would have been rejecting applications from LCCs and other European airlines.
ReplyDeleteAmen. Remember when they used to block LCCs, Malev and others? It wasn't so long ago.
DeleteThere was a period that airlines operating to PRN were not allowed in Serbia. JP and MA spring to mind.
DeleteIt's impressive how much demand there is between Turkey and Serbia. Even in these times
ReplyDeleteI hope another Turkish airline enters the market to deal with the demand. Perhaps Onur Air.
DeleteJust open the entire market! Not just for EU airlines.
ReplyDeleteThey don't have a problem with other non-EU airlines. They just have a problem with Turkish for some reason.
DeleteThis is just absurd at a time you should be begging airlines to come.
ReplyDeleteSo self destructive. I'm amazed.
DeleteAnother example of how Serbian government (regardless of the party in charge) is the biggest enemy of Serbian people and economy!
DeleteWhile I agree that the Serbian Government hasnt been stellar with planning and implementing almost everything in aviation, both BEG and INI have seen new additions even during Covid. No need for begging, we are not that desperate.
DeleteGood
ReplyDeleteWhat is good?
DeleteTurkey has blocked JU in the past. They even impounded one of their B737s for 8 years because they were unhappy with politics in the country.
DeleteYU-ANJ
DeleteSerbia and Turkey have longstanding air battle and this is just part of it.
ReplyDeleteTurkey actually failed to provide any reasonable time slot to JU at the time for IST, when JU had a nice expansion. Only after the retorsion measures against TK were applied in BEG, they just happen to be able to provide a nice time slot for JU in IST.
Today, JU and TK has a nice codeshare agreement in place. However, charter/leisure flights are not part of it, and this type of travel is traditionally reserved for domestic carriers, carrying the tourists abroad. In the old times, this was done by Aviogenex and Jat, and you couldn't see any foreign carrier bringing our tourists abroad. Only when there is a lack of capacity or if the markets are so big, you will see both side's carriers taking this part of air travel share. If Turkey want to react on this CAD's decision, they would just loose tourists that JU is happy to bring to Turkey. And that is how the things go in this field for decades.
The story with slots at old IST is slightly different then you know, it's completely Turkey's internal politics. Operator of old IST was not close to the ruling party, therefore civil aviation authorities were trying to block and divert all demand to the secondary airport, SAW. Once old IST is closed and new IST became operational (this time operated by ruling party's oligarchs), civil aviation authority stopped diverting the traffic to the secondary airport (even blocked all new entries completely) forcing all carriers to fly to new IST. It can be easily seen that the issue at old IST was not capacity, otherwise JU wouldn't be able to get the proper slots upon insistence.
DeleteTurkey is desperately looking for tourists this summer, utilizing TK's low cost product solely for this purpose is a clear sign of what it is trying. Therefore the more JU operates charter to AYT, the better for Turkey, so no problem expected in that context.
That's very interesting. Thanks for the info
DeleteHowever, Jat did have slots at IST and they were using them. They were revoked when Jat rebranded to Air Serbia.
DeleteLaissez faire!
ReplyDeleteAnother big problem is that the Directorate does not protect the rights of passengers. Twice, Air Serbia was more than 3 hours late, I asked for compensation, they did not send me an answer within 60 days, which is defined by law, and when I reported it to the Directorate, they did not take any action. Other airlines regularly paid me compensation for such delays.
ReplyDeleteBravo Serbia, congratulations, seeing what happened in Switzerland with the easy awarding of traffic rights to TK EY QR EK, I can only aplaude to Serbia about so much common sense
ReplyDeleteThis is the perfect example of how JU is being constantly being protected by the government similar to 100% of its projects such as NYC, regional expansion, etc.
ReplyDeleteYou allow TK to operate but you restrict AndalouJet - its foster from not operating and also the average Serb will end up paying more and not enjoying any competition on the route.
This also explains W6's limited expansion and not having FR. What a pity.
Ryanair flies from Nis. Wizz Air is introducing 4 routes from Belgrade this summer and has 2 planes based.
DeleteBanana Republic...
ReplyDeleteBravo! Fully support this.
ReplyDeleteMogu oni koliko hoće da forsiraju AirSerbia-u i njene čartere za cirka 280 e povratna do Antalije ili Bodruma ali će i dalje Pegasus da ih šije sa cenom, Beograd Antalija (Bodrum) sa presedanjem u Istanbulu povratna karta bude od 120 do 160 e, dokle god bude tako idem Pegasus-om
ReplyDeleteKako znas koliko carter kosta - agencija ti da po stavkama aranzman? To sto ti zelis da se ubacis na fakticki privatan let, pa placas visoku cenu, to je nesto drugo.
DeleteПарада кича и проданих душа. Забавно штиво за данашње време.
ReplyDeleteI sense a lot of tourist operators from Serbia would want a choice of airline to Antalya. Imagine if they had a choice between Air Serbia and Andaloujet, but if flights are with Andaloujet all the tickets and travel packages (hotel, air, transfer) had to be purchased directly by consumers only through tourist agencies from Turkey and not from Serbia.
ReplyDeleteI would love to see faces of Serbian tourist agency owners if that would happen, with their business being shut out and advantage given to Turks so Serbian consumers would have a choice! Tourist agencies would then sing a different tune and turn against Andaloujet!
Exactly, evernyone is saying JU influenced this decision, but they are forgetting the tour operator cartel is not naiive at all.
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